And Life Gave me Lemons
by Weiila
Summary: Third genre would be drama if possible. Post Jak 3. To his friends Jak appears just fine, but inside he is tormented by memories. Discovering this, Keira desperately searches for somebody who can help him. JxK. [complete]
1. No innocence left

… And Life gave me Lemons

He was sixteen, and too young to die.

Around him, the world seemed to come to a standstill during that final second. The screams of his comrades and the gunfire mingled with the screeches of savage beasts, becoming a deafening tornado filling his ears. It crashed around inside his brain; a foretaste of the hell the gigantic claw hovering above him promised.

He had never been a believer, but now his entire being cried out to any god that might have bothered to care about a useless little wretch like him; _I have always tried, I swear I tried, have mercy!_

The precursors remained silent. But the monster above him grinned, fangs dripping with saliva illuminated by the fizzling from broken cables and the explosions from fired guns.

It was almost funny. He could no longer feel the pain in his leg, though the sticky warmth still managed to register in his brain. Perhaps this was the only mercy he deserved.

The claw began its descent, to the young soldier's eyes moving slowly, almost lazily. Bitterly he wondered if this was not the moment for a hero to step in – yet he knew there were no heroes in this time and age.

'Mother…'

Stars filled his vision, an eternal chasm lined with the brightest light.

Death?

But no; it moved.

With a loud smash and a roar of pain from the beast, the weight pinning him down disappeared. The universe followed it.

Dazed, he managed to heave himself halfway up in a sitting position, but crashed back down with black spots dancing before his eyes.

"Hold yer yakows, rookie!" a hoarse voice said, and a heavy hand landed on his shoulder, "you're stayin' right here."

Rookie.

The hated word sent blazes through his misting brain, and all the agony from his wounds crashed down. It was as if the world had turned into a sadistic being only intent on making his life living hell. Only humiliation had been missing up until now.

He tried to focus, to form a protest, defend himself. However, as soon as he caught sight of the grim, scarred face above him, the protests sounded limp even before he had attempted to speak up.

His protector appeared even scarier than the metal heads, in fact. Especially when he grinned evilly.

"Yer missing a good show, but at least you'll be able to say ye were here," the blonde stranger said, "lay low, kiddo."

Giving the confused soldier's shoulder a pat, Jinx straightened up and raised his hand as a signal to his part of the troops.

"Everyone follow Pretty Boy!"

They dashed from the shadows and rooftops, blades and guns held in dirty hands taught by a desperate need to survive. It had not been easy to pull them out of hiding, but Jinx had hoarded them up like a sheep dog. They were thieves, murderers, gangsters – Krew's finest, in fact. The soldiers under Torn's command would have been surprised, had they not already been staring at the enigma which tore a path through the army of metal heads.

Via radio Torn had informed his troops that "trustworthy" aid would be coming in to help them, but they had not expected an otherworldly, silvery creature moving so quick that the brain hardly could register it.

The metal heads on the other hand seemed to know exactly what they were dealing with. Like one creature they abandoned their earlier prey, and turned onto the lone fighter in their midst. Black snakes and hulking giants soared over and into their brethren, roaring in agony after facing the wrath of this warrior. But there were hundreds of them.

The entire horde descended on the intruder in a storm of hungry jaws and gigantic claws, and the light drowned.

Jinx watched this, for a moment frozen in mid step. His gun almost fell out of his hand.

"You fucking idiot!"

He rushed forwards, cursing and firing at the monsters that once again had turned the tide of fate, at a time when the world for once had been on the right track. Around him, the soldiers and outlaws continued to move, completely shaken from the first surprise by the shocking death of their unexpected savior.

Such was the way of things until the horde buckled, and an explosion of dark lightning sent the metal heads flying.

Jinx grinned, while several of the elves around him recoiled in horror.

What had been a shining warrior when it entered the living nightmare, had now become a horned demon. It was vaguely elflike with the long ears, but its skin was sickly purple and instead of nails it had claws rivaling even the metal heads'. As it turned around, the troops were met by a disdainful glare from a pair of pitch black eyes, framed by the sprays of sickly green metal head blood.

Something in the picture seemed heavily askew, however.

An orange rodent wearing goggles and a pair of blue shorts stood on the demon's shoulder, leisurely leaning against its pale head. With a smirk huge enough to split its head, it raised a tiny finger towards the closest heap of dazed metal heads and spoke.

"Don't make him angry. You wouldn't like him when he's angry."

It looked down at the snarling creature whose shoulder it used as a means of travel, and quickly turned back to the monsters with an – if possible – even bigger smirk.

"Oops. Too late!"

A very important thing about metal heads would be their inability to understand fear, however. One by one they regained orientation and threw themselves at the demon again, never minding the fact that they were thrown back in slices or twitching under the force of the dark lightning. The demon whirled around like a murderous tornado, the rodent on his shoulder hanging on for dear life.

"Breaktime's over!" Jinx snarled at the men around him, "you either fight them or me an' Torn!"

That threat worked wonders. Guns immediately fired and well trained hands rammed daggers into the few vulnerable spots offered on the distracted metal heads. Despite their lowering numbers, the beasts ignored everything except the demon. It was as if they had been born with the instinct of killing this one creature.

Any tactician would have cried tears of blood if they had seen this idiocy. Without a leader the metal heads were blind to everything but their inbred hatred for the precursors' champion.

The battle was brutal, but it ended far quicker than it would have done without the reinforcements. Merely a few minutes later, Jinx lit a cigarette and breathed in the sweet toxin with great satisfaction. Puffing out clouds of smoke on it he pulled out a communicator and smacked it a few times before it crackled to life. A tattooed face framed with brown hair appeared on the small screen.

"Yo," Jinx said, grinning, "we're just cleaning up over here."

"Good work," Torn replied, his voice lined with static noise due to the bad line, "how many injured?"

Jinx looked around at the piles of metal heads and soldiers lining the cracked streets. The slums had never been pretty, but they were home. And messier than ever, now. Drat.

"Could've been worse," the far from sophisticated elf eventually reported.

On the other end of town, Torn rolled his eyes in frustration.

"Numbers, Jinx," he demanded.

"Oh, I'd say about half of what ye bet on. We got here quickly."

Torn nodded, inwardly breathing a deep sigh of relief. Of course, he would not let his image be ruined by showing something like that on the outside though.

"How's Jak?" he asked.

"Clutching his blonde little head last I checked," Jinx replied, "I'd say just peachy."

"Hey!" a whiny voice piped up in the background.

"The rat's still alive too," Jinx added and pulled a fake grimace of regret, "sorry, chief."

"Try harder next time," Torn said, smirking as Daxter's shrill protest reached the speakers of Jinx' communicator.

"Sure thing, boss."

"In any case, set up things over there and then come back here with Jak."

Jinx nodded understanding, and turned off the link to the city defense's somewhat rickety headquarters. He looked up and took a step back from nearly being kissed by an insulted ottsel. Twisted as he was, there were things even Jinx did not consider worth trying.

"Whatever," he cut off Daxter's complains, and pinched the furball's mouth shut for good measure, "Torn says to come back home before it gets dark."

"Fine."

That was Jak's sole comment. Daxter, on the other hand, produced a cacophony of "Mfghm!" sounds while angrily trying to bend his lips free from Jinx' tobacco scented, black nailed and bloody fingertips.

Jinx looked the fighter over for a moment, then gave him an amused and wicked smirk.

"And Jakey boy, you look really gutsy right now. You make a guy like me proud."

Jak would have replied, but Daxter managed to break free at that very moment. What happened next should be no surprise.

"Gah! Toothpaste! Mouthwash! And for you, soap! Have you ever heard of it? Lovely invention, almost as nice as pants- ow!"

The rant which might have gone on and on _and on _ended with Jak's backhand connecting with Daxter's head.

"_Whaat_?" the rodent complained.

Jak merely rolled his eyes and turned to walk towards the waiting vehicles. The parking left something to be desired, but he and Jinx had been rushing to get to the battle scene.

As the warrior sat down in the two-seater hover, a careful cheer rose from a couple of throats. It was soon enforced by more and more fighters and soldiers, some who lacked the strength to cheer at least waving a hand towards the hero.

Ah yes, a hero once more, from being thrown out and left to die.

Not everyone cheered though, remaining skeptical. Daxter grinned like a maniac and performed a victory dance on his seat, but Jak merely smiled a bit at the victorious spoils. He started the engine and steered the hover upwards, away from the sullied streets.

But he really preferred being down there, as long as there was something to fight.

'And it's "Mar".'

'-'

Hot water hammered against his body, dangerously close to scalding. If possible he would have turned the heat on even further.

By the goodwill of some higher force – he had a hard time deciding whether or not to believe in the precursors after all he had been through – the waterlines had managed to remain mostly intact. At least over here in the Freedom HQ.

Jak did not bother with soap past getting rid of the worst dirt from his hair and face, the rest of the muck was more or less boiled away.

Plans for tonight; wash, sleep, gun course. Unless there was another sudden attack from metal heads with a cause.

The assault today had been very sudden. In essence the past day consisted of saving the world, speak with the precursors, decide to not go into the universe, get a call for help from Haven and dash back to the city to save the day. Again. Well, at least this was a hero who kept himself busy.

Jak liked keeping himself busy. Fighting for his life served excellently to keep his thoughts straight.

Later he would make sure he got on the team searching for the tunnels through which the metal heads had reached the slums. Until that got organized, he would spend some quality time blowing cardboard enemies into confetti.

Oh sure, there were other means of fending off thoughts he did not want, and he certainly knew where to find those means. The smell of gunpowder and the familiar weight of the morph gun in his hands simply suited him better.

Not to mention the fact that he already had enough women to worr-

He turned the left handle on the shower further back, and the water crashed down against his skin.

Much better.

One might start to worry that the rough string of twine around his neck would start to melt soon, however. The key hanging on it sure was starting to feel uncomfortably hot.

When he began to feel dizzy he lowered the temperature of the water before turning it off, to make sure he would not do something stupid like faint because of the cooler air outside of the shower room. Despite his efforts to harden his body against the next action, his teeth immediately began to chatter when he turned off the water completely and stepped back. He hurried over the prickled, moist floor and ripped his towel from the wall.

Jak quickly rubbed his face with the soft cloth, and then proceeded to give the rest of himself the same treatment. He still shivered with the cold, but it became better as soon as he left the "soaked" status.

Letting out a deep sigh of relief he wrapped the now damp towel around his waist and headed for the changing-room, flicking his long, still dripping ears to rid them of the water.

The room he entered was ruled by small, darkly blue lockers. They were arranged in five rows, forming four aisles taking up the left side of the area. Simple metal benches with dully black pillows lined the right wall.

Jak located the small metal closet he had chosen before heading into the shower, and pulled the simple necklace with the key over his head. The still warm piece of metal smacked against his right ear, and he automatically shook his head in protest.

Holding up the offending little trinket he gave it a dull glare, but flinched when it reflected the cold light of the lamps above. A drop of water hung on the tip of the key, the reflection forming a tiny star on the liquid.

_Coming closer can't get free can't move needle almost there cold sting on skin breaking through flesh can't move it hurts stop stop it STOP!_

The lock nearly broke as Jak rammed the key into it with all his might. He staggered backwards, swearing and clutching his pounding fingers. The towel fell to the floor, forgotten.

Chest heaving with the deep gulps of air that he desperately sucked in, Jak leant his bare back against the row of lockers opposite of his. The metal beneath the blue color felt icily cold to his moist skin, but the simple pain gave him a stable point to focus on.

He could only remain paralyzed for a few seconds. Though the locker room was empty now, dirty soldiers could come pouring in at any minute. Jak knew that he could not afford to be seen in this state; hero or not he was already a "dark eco freak" and did not need to acquire even more reasons for strange looks. Foremost however, he would not allow himself this weakness.

What was that saying? "The only thing to do is to break down and move on". Yep. Except that Jak hardly planned on having a breakdown anytime soon. He had better things to do.

'Focus, man, focus…'

He closed his eyes and took in a few more deep breaths while massaging his now aching fingers. At least he had not managed to break any bones when taking out his minor psychosis on the key. That would have been a hoot to explain.

Months and months of steeling himself against the memories helped him force the images back down into the closed vault of his mind. Once again he noticed how much harder it was when there was no adrenaline or blabbering sidekick to help him concentrate on something else. Damn Daxter for slipping away with Tess at the first possible moment… uh…

Suddenly there was a whole new array of bad mental images that Jak had to struggle against. Well, they did at least out-scream the first ones, with their power of novelty.

Deciding that he could move on again, Jak picked up the towel from the floor using his healthier hand. Hanging the cloth over his wet mop of blond hair, he proceeded to open the locker. The lock did let out a screeching sound in protest against the treatment it had received, but it was not strong enough to hold back the champion of the world. Jak rolled his eyes at all creation in general and reached into the locker.

Hmm, clean clothes. How revolutionary. He could not remember when he last wore something that was not ripped by the edges and covered with dust, sand and stains of mysterious colors.

Jak began to get dressed, rubbing his hair with the towel in between. Even the pain in his hand began to fade, but he had already come to the decision that sleep was off his to-do-list.

Gun course. Explosions. Adrenaline kick. Now.

Cold drops of water still dripped down his back from his hair as he headed out, all decked up in full armor as if expecting an attack.

He did not as much expect as hope.

'-'

_Author's note: I believe that the "break down and move on" quote was first used by the Swedish sportsman Per Elofson, but I might be wrong. Others have said it too. Therefore, it ain't impossible that it would have been thought of in the Jak and Daxter world as well. _

_Constructive criticism is highly welcome!_


	2. Not the one I used to know

Chapter 2, Echoes from the past

The familiar streets of Haven City swept by beneath him. The soldiers in blue were long since a common sight, as opposed to the red and yellow ones which hardly a year ago had been ruling the town. But now, nobody would be shot down for merely bumping into an armed man. No, a speck of red would be the source of alarm these days. However, Jak failed to spot anything in the hated color even though it was a considerable distance between the HQ and the harbor.

No, times had changed, even in the past few days. There were now a few brave civilians out on foot, and the snapshots of conversations which Jak caught along his way definitely sounded a lot more optimistic than those he had grown accustomed to hear. Instead of the grim conclusions of certain doom, people appeared to be discussing things such as dates, the possibility of rebuilding the town and even – how daring the thought – the future.

With the war factory and main metal head nest blown up, and Erol gone, there really was no war left to fight. In the last couple of days there had only been that random outbreak earlier this evening.

As he passed overhead of far more hopeful people than he had seen in weeks, Jak found himself struggling between the decision to hurry to the gun course, or slow down to listen. The voices, warmed with smiles and relief reached out to him. It had been ages…

A young woman spoke to two soldiers, holding a securely wrapped up bundle in her arms.

"… a boy," she said, eyes sparkling with joy, "we're going to name…"

Jak turned the handle and the zoomer shot forwards, past the small group before he could hear anything more.

There was another thing he did not want to be reminded of.

If he could just keep from thinking, everything was fine. Not only to stop the psychological agony, but also to stave the risk of his dark side breaking free. Even though the precursors had made it far easier for him to control himself with the light powers balancing the dark, the dark eco remained inside of him.

Jak gritted his teeth as his pitch black well of memories nearly spewed another wave at him. He needed something to do, _right now_.

The vast waters of the harbor spread out before him, to Jak looking like an obscure blessing. He sharply turned right and pointed the zoomer's nose a little downwards as his final goal came within sight.

He parked just outside the door with the skill of a self-trained driver and hopped off. The small vehicle would surely be gone when he came back out, but he could care less. It happened all the time. Apart from the use of your own feet, all methods of travel appeared to be collective property in Haven City. Democratic, really. At least if you were a thief. Jak did not care about that label either.

The door obediently opened as soon as the sensors picked up his movement, and he stepped inside. The sharp smell of burnt gunpowder filled his nostrils and he breathed in deeply. Finally.

He was so far off into his own resolve that not before he had pulled out his morph gun and set it to blaster mod did he notice that something was askew. In retrospect, he mentally kicked himself for it. Hard.

"Boom, baby! Badaboom!"

"Just a thousand more points to silver! We could make it!"

The only excuse for not noticing the two crazed ottsels on the control panel, Jak figured, must have been that until those comments they had remained silent with tense excitement. Which, in Daxter's case, did not seem like a possibility.

Jak was quite disgusted with himself for being so careless. Had there been enemies instead of junior precursors, he might have been dead. Then again, enemies tended to set his instincts flaring long before the attack came.

Yeah, that thought made him feel better.

Hanging his weapon on a shoulder he crossed the floor.

"What are you doing?" he said.

Daxter half turned away from the small screen he and Tess were watching.

"Evening there, Jak," the male ottsel grinned, "we're just watching… Jak!"

Suddenly with eyes open wide, Daxter flung his back against the screen and spread his stick thin arms over the glass while summoning the most plastic innocent smile since the dawn of elfkind. Tess immediately followed suit. Their scrawny bodies only partly managed to obscure the blurry image of a long-eared character moving through the gun course.

Jak raised an eyebrow.

"Why hi there, big buddy," Daxter began to babble, nonsurprisingly, "weren't you going in for some rest and relaxation? Bunk bed too soft after the rocks in Spargus?"

He turned to Tess with an overly pained expression.

"Let me tell you, babe, you've _never_ known the meaning of 'uncomfortable' before you try to take a nap in that town. Makes my back hurt just to think of it!"

"Oh, my poor shnook-munchs!" Tess cooed, leaving the attempt to hide the screen in favor of giving her darling a big hug.

If "big" was a suitable word for her anymore could of course be discussed.

Jak was about to ask them to either take it somewhere else or at least answer his question, but the exit door of the course opened and this cut him off.

Daxter eeped, but it was too late. Jak's eyebrows twitched.

"Wow, you've done a great job on the improvement, Tess! The fire rate could be tweaked just a little, but I'm really impressed by what you have…"

The voice was strange for a woman's, high-pitched and hoarse at the same time. A pair of dainty hands spun a small handgun each around and up in a wide arc above a head crowned by teal hair, masterfully catching both of the weapons in the opposite hands.

"I'm sure that if we make a bigger model they will be- what?"

Dear, absentminded Keira finally took heed of the strained grins on the two ottsels' faces. She also noted that there was somebody else in the room, and turned her head.

"Jak! Oh, uhm…"

She quickly hid the guns behind her back and lowered her face, looking up at him through her eyelashes.

Jak watched all of this with growing confusion.

"What?" he finally managed to ask.

It seemed to be the only word able to sum up the entire situation.

"Nothing, nothing at all," Keira said, her voice suddenly devoid of the earlier energy.

She gave him a dreamy smile.

"I thought you were resting," she added.

To summarize, Jak had never been good with words. It was easier to just follow the gut feeling and shoot, punch or chew out anything that looked like a threat whenever he was unsure of what was going on. This however did not apply to the rules he was used to. Normally, being in an unfamiliar situation meant frustration and anger, not confusion.

Just a moment ago, it had been as if a dearly missed ghost from the past had appeared before him, and now this familiar phantom had reverted back into something he did not recognize.

It all boiled down to one possible pick of action.

"When did you become such a girl?" he said.

"What? I've always been a girl, you know," Keira replied.

There was a certain sharpness behind the smile, however. The dreamy, strange smile that she had evolved merely a short time ago. It was as if she had practiced it.

"Sorry," she said, perking up a little, "I just remembered that father asked me to come back early. I'll see you later…"

She started towards the door leading outside, but Jak stepped into her path. He frowned, and she met that look with a nervous smile.

"What is it?" she innocently asked.

Jak raised his free hand with the palm upwards, twitching his fingers in a silent demand. For a moment, Keira remained still. Eventually however, she sighed and surrendered one of the guns to her friend's waiting grip.

It hardly weighed anything, and in compare to his normal arsenal it looked more like a toy than a weapon. But… "just a thousand more points to silver"?

"What are you doing?" he asked, giving all three of them a dose of his stern look.

He did in no way like the strange behavior of his friends. It made him feel itchy. The fact that the trio all looked a little guilty did not make things any better.

Finally, Tess piped up.

"I have been working on these lightweight handguns for a while, on the side of making the big babies," she said and leapt off the control panel, waving her arms around for emphasis as she spoke, "backup stuff, you know? They pack a lot of power despite their size, thanks to the meta-technology derived from precursor-nano-stabilizators. It wasn't easy deciphering the microcoding from the pseudo-science charts, but once we finished that it was simple to finish off the design."

She looked up at him with big, expectant eyes.

"Aha, right. Whatever," Jak said and nodded.

Despite his – albeit vague – verification of Tess' skills, he had this nagging feeling that what she just said consisted of nothing but techno-babble. The suspicion of foul play grew larger when he turned to speak with Keira again, only to find an empty spot where she had been standing. A quick look around and he spotted her on her sneaking way towards the door.

"Wait, Keira!"

She immediately straightened up, stiff as a poker or a soldier hearing his lieutenant scream bloody murder after finding the charred remains of the ammo shed.

"Yes?" she said in a meek voice, without turning around.

Jak took a few steps forwards, but stopped. She seemed absolutely spooked, and though he could not understand why he was suspecting that it was his fault.

"Why are you acting so weird?" he asked, glancing between her and the small gun in his hand.

"I-I have no idea what you're talking about."

She still refused to turn around.

Okay, this really was a situation he could not sort out. Jak turned his head and gave Tess as much a pleading look as his macho appearance allowed. She in turn looked up at Daxter.

The male ottsel quickly realized that he was out of people to pass the look to, as Keira sternly watched the door before her. With a dramatic sigh, Daxter heaved his upper body and arms forwards.

"Oh give it up, Keira," he said, "you're busted."

"Busted?" Jak repeated, turning back to his other childhood friend.

The female elf's shoulders fell and she turned around, sighing softly.

"I was… working on a surprise," she said and smiled.

Despite the fact that the smile was less dreamy this time, that relief did not keep Jak from noting the hesitation following "I was". Keira's voice became more steady past that, as well.

"The truth is," she continued and held up the gun she still had in her custody, "I am the one behind these babies, not Tess. She's just been tweaking them a little for me."

There was still something that she did not tell him, Jak suspected. But the lack of something to prove it with kept him from arguing, and he decided to just accept what he was given. Keira, he could trust. He offered her the gun he had taken, and she nabbed it from his hand with a grateful smile.

"That's cool," he said and tilted his head, "since when are you making guns though? And testing them yourself?"

"I, ah…"

Keira looked away, using pocketing the two guns into a couple of leather sheaths hanging in her belt as a blatant excuse to not meet his eyes. Had Jak not noted the hint of pink on her cheeks, he would have started to work up a good deal of irritation by now. But with all the proof pointing at an embarrassed Keira, the confusion kept its grip of his mind.

Putting the weapons away could not take so long of course, and soon she was forced to straighten up again. Despite this, she kept averting her gaze.

The silence painfully stretched.

"I… I wanted to finish them earlier," she finally said, "but you already won, so…"

He must have done something wrong, because he felt a small stitch of guilt even if he had no idea why. It was starting to get on his nerves, and quickly.

"I stopped Erol, but there are still metal heads out there," he said, desperately trying to offer a penance, "besides…"

In the racking of his brain to find something good to say, he only managed to stumble onto one of the subjects he had tried to keep off his mind for a few days. Dammit. Well, might as well use it.

Voice growing softer and tiredly determined, he raised his hand to hold the wrist armor up for inspection.

"… I'm sure that I'll be needing new weapons sooner or later anyway."

"For new adventures, huh?" Keira said.

"Yeah."

The young woman reached out and poked the shell armor with her pointing finger, muttering something that sounded like "Interesting…" under her breath.

"This is said to be the armor that the great Mar wore," Jak said, letting her continue her antics, "and it fits me perfectly."

Keira's movements stopped dead.

"Oh," she said.

They watched each other for a moment, both trying to figure out all the possibilities this fact opened up.

"We don't know if you are _the_ Mar, though," Keira eventually pointed out, trying to smile a little again.

Jak was about to agree, noting that Ashelin had told him the same just before they got the call for help from Haven. But another recent memory about Ashelin sparked up, and he decided to remain silent about what she had said. It was enough that the mere thought of her made him feel awkward before Keira.

Instead, he spoke without thinking and heard his own voice all too late.

"I might have been named Mar after the great one, but father never knew-"

He cut himself off with a hiss, but it was too late.

_"And he never knew… how delightful."_

_Damas__' dead body father is dead and I never knew he never knew Veger smirking tear him apart drink his blood kill him killhimkillhimkillhimki_

_"Aaaaggh! VEGER!"_

Snarling and clutching his mouth, Jak spun away from Keira. The morph gun hit the floor with a violent clanking sound, but he could not care. His skin violently tingled and he knew fully well that a hand would not keep the fangs from sprouting.

No no no no… not here, not in front of her!

He could vaguely hear voices screaming his name, his second name, but the rage was pounding at him, the dark eco in his veins boiling hot it hurt _it hurt_…

"Bad Jak! No doing the super moves in front of the ladies! No biscuit!"

"Jak!"

Gentle warmth exploded from his chest and streamed through him, forcing the darkness back down under control. With a gasp he lurched forwards, one hand hitting the rough floor while the other remained by his lips.

No… the dark eco did not have the dominance it had savored not long ago. He could control it now. But the wound was still wide open, he had not dealt with the pain yet.

It took his brain several moments to cool down enough to start processing the information his senses provided. Another couple of seconds were also needed before it took heed of the unfamiliar sensation of somebody touching his arms.

He opened his eyes, dully curious about this new approach. Nobody ever touched him, it was all grabbing, tearing and punching. More often than not with claws.

No, that was wrong… Ashelin did touch him. Placed her hand on his armor, and he let her move closer. Lightheaded from the battle won, intoxicated by the feeling of triumph.

She was the first one he saw after winning. It should have been Keira. It had always been Keira, but she had changed. She would no longer have gone that close to the battle.

What happened?

A pair of seemingly dainty hands curled their way in between the pieces of his armor. The warm fingers against his skin had been tempered by oil and machine work, and lacked that ladylike softness that her new personality demanded. No… Keira was not a dreamy little girl. He had seen it just a few minutes ago, she was still the energetic woman on her way towards "nutty inventor" status. The woman whose mere silhouette behind a curtain had made his face twitch until Daxter's paw to his forehead had awakened him from the paralyzed staring. Maybe he had known that it was her, but never dared to believe it until she stepped out upon hearing Daxter's familiar voice. The old attraction had definitely been there, warped and strengthened by his two years of lonely agony.

But then that…

_"And Jak!__ You look… different."_

A change of tone might be felt much harder than a scream.

He was either changed, a freak, "not the one I used to know" – even those who were hardened by countless battles against the metal heads, such as Torn and Ashelin, drew back when they saw him turn into a monster.

_"Ah… then he is dangerous. And that could be useful."_

A tone that was only pleased, that hinted at that the "could be" was only a possibility easily replaced with "is". Somebody that did not more than raise an eyebrow, with curiosity and fascination instead of fear and disgust.

But what would Damas have said if he knew that it was his own flesh and blood which grew horns and claws?

'I'm a…'

No no… don't think, don't remember, stay focused…

Keira's repeated calling of his name and her shaking his arms brought him back to reality. Muttering something that he did not even hear himself, he shook himself free and ripped the morph gun from the floor as he passed it.

"Tess, set the course for the highest danger level," he growled, eyes set on the door between the set up battle and him.

Had the door been a little more sentient it would have been running for the hills by now.

"Oh, uh… right away!" Tess said.

She dashed across the floor and managed to make it up on the control panel before Jak reached the end of the room. Fearing that he might blow the door open she quickly set the program due to his wishes.

"Thanks," he snarled and stepped through as soon as an entrance was offered.

The door slid shut behind him and immediately the sound of gunshots rung though it, only partly muffled by the thick walls.

Keira listened for several seconds before she finally stood up.

"Does that happen often?" she asked Daxter.

The ottsel tilted his head, watching the door with his arms folded.

"Not as often as it used to, now that he's got the flashy stuff implanted and all that jazz," he said, "it was no cakewalk before that though. Never knew when to duck away from those horns. They almost nicked my tail a couple of times!"

For a moment Keira felt inclined to ask what Daxter had been doing with his tail in Jak's hair, but she controlled herself. Probably one of those man-to-man things, anyway.

Daxter made a thoughtful sound and began to vigorously scratch his hair.

"Was ages since I saw him about to go super-crazed without anything nasty with lasers or fangs around, though. Guess he's still mad about Damas, considering what he said before the snarling."

Watching the door, a frown appeared on Keira's forehead.

"Yeah, that really must hurt," she murmured.

She looked back down at Daxter.

"Does he ever talk about things when he's feeling down?"

The ottsel's brow – such as it was – twitched, and he gave her a bewildered look.

"Feeling down? Keira, sugar, you can't talk about 'feeling down' when it comes to Jak. Look at him go!"

He waved an entire arm towards the gun course, from which the explosions kept coming in uneven waves.

"He blows stuff up, and does a good job too," Tess called from the other end of the room.

"Yep!" Daxter said with a proud grin, "he ain't feeling down, he's just-"

"Got issues," Keira said, her fingertips drumming against her forehead.

"Now that's a cruel way to put it!" Daxter protested.

"No!"

Keira scowled at the closed doors.

"If he keeps bottling everything up, it's no wonder he loses control," she snarled, "even you should understand that."

Daxter loudly cleared his throat and strutted around for a few seconds before finally getting around to answer.

"Well, y'know," he said, "Jak deals with stuff. Like now. He ain't sitting around, moping like there's no tomorrow. And if there weren't he'd go out and beat up the reason until it was okay again."

"I suppose we should be grateful that he fights instead of drink…"

"What's your problem here, Keira?" Daxter said, "you're designing weapons to help him, for the precursors' – which me and my Tessy-poo are! – sake."

Keira looked down at the sheaths holding her guns, and sighed.

"Yeah, yeah," she said and returned to staring at the door, "but what happens when he runs out of bullets?"

"He finds some more, of course!"

Daxter scowled up at Keira, a worried look on his face.

"Are you feeling okay? That ain't the hardest thing to figure out, you know," he added.

"That's not what I… oh never mind."

Sighing, Keira turned around and began walking towards the exit.

"I'll see you later," she said, waving over her shoulder.

"Sure thing. Do get some sleep to get your head straight, okay? I'll be worried otherwise!"

No reply. Keira left.

Daxter turned around to see Tess watching him, shaking her head with an exasperated sigh.

"Whaat?" he said.

Outside, Keira glared up at the dark sky above the harbor's black water. Metallic walls rose up from the waves and all around her, even the ground beneath her feet was hammered out by elf hands.

She was a mechanic, and metal was one of her natural elements because of that. But this place, it lacked love. Industry had put it together, not caring hands.

"I hate this place. Hate it."


	3. Nothing I can do

Chapter 3, The Baron's shadow

"Ashelin…"

"What?"

The red-haired leader of Haven City's defense turned around sharply, and gave the figure in the door a cold glare. She had little patience with anybody who failed to be the person she was hoping to see. From the other end of the round table, Torn narrowed his eyes at his superior.

Ashelin forced her features to even out as she realized who it was. While she had lost a good deal of respect for Keira lately, Samos' daughter was still skilled and a friend. Why did she have to be such a ditz, though? Ashelin knew that there had been a lot more spunk in the other woman before, or at least she seemed to remember things being so. It was hard to believe now, when Keira at best piped up in agreement to something somebody else said.

The redhead was about to get quite a surprise, however.

Keira looked around, noting the absence of Pecker, Onin and her own father. While Torn was still there, she mentally shrugged and decided that it did not matter. This was important, and perhaps the former sub-leader of the Underground could help as well.

"Do you have a moment?" she asked, "both of you?"

Ashelin looked around and met Torn's eyes. He frowned, but nodded.

"Nothing seems to be going to hell right now, at least," he confirmed.

He studied Keira as she walked closer, noting with some bewilderment how determined she looked. The childish shyness which he had been used to seemed to have disappeared.

She stopped in front of Ashelin, and took in a deep breath.

"I met Jak at the gun course-" she started.

"Jak? Shouldn't he be resting up?" Ashelin interrupted.

"Why in the blazes were _you_ there?" Torn interrupted.

"I thought so too," Keira told Ashelin, while waving a dismissive hand at Torn.

She clenched her teeth.

"I'm worried about him," she said, "I don't think he's doing well."

This was met by silence.

Finally, after several seconds, Torn shrugged.

"I wouldn't worry," he said, "Jak's always cranky between battles. It'll pass."

"No, he's not cranky, it's worse!" Keira said, placing both her hands on the table with a loud smack, "he seemed calm, but then when he mentioned his father he suddenly fell down and started transforming."

"Is he okay?" Ashelin demanded.

Keira bit her own cheek. A nasty lump was forming in her throat, strangely since she was surrendering something she had already given up on to her… rival. How could it possibly still hurt?

No… she had surrendered the fact that there was little more she could do to aid Jak in his physical battles. The emotional ones she had still tried to keep safe, in her own mind at least. Tried to make it easier on him to forget her, it was the only thing she could do to help. He should not have to be torn, on top of everything.

'But what about _me_?!'

She took in another deep breath to calm herself. She had come here to get the help which she could not provide herself. If that was the last thing she could offer him, then by the precursors' fur she would do it. If there was anything at all that could save Jak from his pain, she would try to provide.

"He's okay now," she said, "rushed into the gun course and started blasting away. I don't think that he's fully well, though."

"Post traumatic experience," Ashelin said, turning away, "it'll pass. Jak is stronger than you think."

Keira had been prepared to ensure Jak's need for somebody who could help him deal with his pain. She had not foreseen accusations towards her own person.

The past year, all the emotions she had tried to kill to give Jak a chance to move on to someone who understood him better, sprung up and slapped her in the face as Ashelin coldly dismissed her judgment.

She exploded.

"I have known Jak far longer than you!" Keira snarled, "you weren't there! You didn't see him! How can you say that?"

Ashelin started and spun around, staring at the other woman in surprise. She had not believed that the dainty little mechanic was able to raise her voice that much. On the other side of the room Torn cocked his eyebrows.

"You never saw Jak like he used to be! Why would- how could you understand what happened?! The difference between who he was at home and what he became here?!"

Keira advanced, and Ashelin drew back in her shock due to the radical change that had occurred. Her battle hardened instincts screamed at her to do something about this threat, but she struggled to control them – this was not an enemy. Enough rage streamed from the dainty Keira to make anybody worry about her intentions, however.

Torn desperately wished that he was somewhere, anywhere else.

And Keira forgot to think.

"He found his father just when that father died right before his eyes! How dare you claim that he would not be hurt-"

_Smack_!

Torn blinked. Ashelin did too, and Keira lost her voice. The two women stared at each other, one's hand a mere inch from the other's cheek. Keira's whole arm vibrated, but her wrist remained steady against Ashelin's.

Slowly, the redhead withdrew her hand.

"Don't…" she said, voice hoarse with emotions as she turned away, "don't mention Jak and fathers in the same sentence when you speak with me."

Keira took a step back, wavering between being horrified at what she had caused, or to give in to the tiny stitch of dark glee that bubbled deep down inside her. The latter sickened her, to find something so vile within herself. At the same time, she had dearly wanted to see Ashelin shook from her high yakows.

With a deep sigh, Ashelin placed her hands and entire weight on the table, letting her head drop between her shoulders. The red dreadlocks sloshed down around the base of her long ears while she gritted her teeth.

"Keira…" she finally said, almost croaking, "if Jak is hurting because of Damas, I'm definitely not the right one to help him."

"But you-" Keira started.

"I could never, _ever_ face him about his father," Ashelin sharply interrupted, shaking her head without looking up, "you know what happened between him and mine."

Keira watched her in silence, unable to think of anything to say. Finally, Ashelin straightened up but still refused to look neither Keira nor Torn in the eye. She folded her arms and turned her back to both of them.

"I didn't know what father was doing, and I definitely didn't know that he had done it to Jak until long after I first met Jak," she told the blinking walls.

She took a few steps away, paused, and shook her head again. Unseen to her two friends, she pinched her eyes tightly shut.

"My father was a cruel dictator," she said, voice wavering between rage and resentful sorrow, "but he was still my father. Did Jak kill him?"

Keira gasped, pressing a hand to her mouth. Ignored by both women, Torn developed an even deeper frown.

"He said that it was Kor…" Keira finally said, but her voice did not quite rise as much as she tried to make it do.

"Yes, he and Daxter said so," Ashelin coldly said, "but they were the only surviving witnesses. Would they want me to know?"

Her head dropped again and she covered her eyes with a hand.

"I want to believe Jak, however," she said, "trust me, Keira, I care about him. But there is so much trash between us, and yet…"

She finally turned around and faced Keira, but there was an apparent resistance in her movements. For a second, her gaze flew towards Torn and back again.

"You know that when he and Daxter came back from the battle against Erol, me and him, we…?"

Keira thought that the clog in her throat would keep her from doing it, but somehow she managed to nod.

"I… guessed so," she pressed out.

It was lucky that Torn did not carry anything in his hands. It would have been pulverized, had it even been eco crystals.

"I used to… feel ashamed when I was around Jak," Ashelin continued, looking away, "once I learned what father had done. Then, I felt that I was the one who had to make amends. Maybe I still do. Nothing could ever make it okay, though…"

Once again she sighed.

"And I can't do anything this time, Keira, you'll have to find somebody else."

All air left Keira as her glimmer of hope finally died. She had counted on Ashelin's help; in the mechanic's eyes the tattooed woman seemed to be Jak's match.

'Far better than me, at least.'

But Ashelin would not even try. Deep down Keira did understand the predicament, but right then and there she could only feel bitter disappointment.

"But who, then?" she asked, clenching her fists.

She almost jumped when another voice came from the other end of the table – she had completely forgotten Torn.

"Maybe that giant war factory, Sig," he grimly said, "he and Jak always seemed like a pair of asskicking peas in a pod."

Ashelin perked up a little.

"Yes," she said, "he knew Damas as well. We should ask him-"

"_I_ will ask him."

Keira turned and marched out of the room, her jaw clenched so tightly that the teeth almost broke.

Even before the door had closed behind the mechanic, Ashelin was hiding her eyes under a hand again and muttering in frustration. A few moments after Keira had left, she looked up and glared at Torn. He glared back, facing the mix of anger and hesitation in the face of the woman he loved.

He was tempted, it screamed in every fiber in his body, to thank her for letting him know that he had been left behind because of a guilt-trip. But, despite how much filth he had assembled upon himself, he was still better than that. Or he knew women's scorn better than that.

Or perhaps he was too intelligent to make things worse. Hell, did he not know quite a lot about guilt because of what he had done for Ashelin? Even if she ever forgave him for betraying the Underground to protect her, it would take an eternity before he could completely cast it aside himself.

So instead of digging deeper into the wound she had exposed to him, he chose to let it slip.

"You wanna be alone?" he said, surprising himself with his neutral tone.

"Huh…"

Ashelin folded her arms, narrowing her eyes further at him.

"Aren't you going to hold it against me?" she said.

'Oh, don't tempt me, woman…' he thought.

Yet he still managed to control himself.

"Wouldn't make me happier," he just said.

They both silently thanked the precursors – with a bit of doubt, of course – when right at that moment a red lamp on the table began to blink, announcing a patrol's call for help. It gave them a breather to cool off, and maybe later they could sort this mess out. Hopefully.


	4. A glimmer of light

Chapter 4, The ruined city

Jak awoke from his unconscious state, which might have been called "sleep" had it been a little less coma-like. The reason he woke up could have been more pleasant, too.

"Jaak! The flying stuff is talking again!"

"Mgrfunkinshaddup…"

Daxter masterfully avoided the arm blindly swinging towards him, and dived back up to the burr of green-blond hair which was about to submerge beneath the blanket again. He was about to start pulling at the aforementioned hair, when the floating communicator pushed him aside and bore down over the pillow like an irritated Samos on a lecture.

It was not Samos who owned the voice shouting through the network, however.

"Jak! Outta bed with you, we've got metal heads to toast! This ain't the time for beauty naps!"

Jak poked his head out and blinked like an owl at the sun burnt, partly metallic face displayed on the static screen.

"What time is it?" he grunted.

"Tomorrow evening," Daxter chimed in, his head popping up above the bedside, "I was about to order an autopsy for ya."

Jak threw the blanket over Daxter and sat up, scratching his chin while yawning. A distinct stubble around the goatee made the scratching more interesting.

"What're they doing this time?" Jak muttered at the communicator, sleepiness lacing his voice.

He did not really feel like speaking as loud as he had to, but Daxter's noisy protests as he struggled to find his way out of the blanket forced Jak to raise his own volume.

"Sneaky little bastards have started infesting the old city ruins," Sig reported, "they've killed a lot of wild leaper lizards in the last few days."

"Sounds like newbie work to me," Jak said.

As much as he enjoyed battle, for the moment he felt like hell and wanted to sleep. He was about to swat the communicator aside and crash back on the bed when Sig started protesting.

"Think I'd call you for rookie stunts?" he snorted, "trust me, they're enough to chew. You gotta be pretty damn quick to deal with them."

"Which excludes most of you bulky misters," Daxter called as he poked his head out from the cavern of cloth.

Jak grunted something unintelligible before finally standing up.

"Okay, fine," he said, "I'm on my way."

"Knew I could count on ya. See you outside the gate."

The communicator's screen went black, and the whole thing sunk to the floor, shrinking like a pricked balloon until it was small enough to fit in a pocket.

Yawning, Jak sluggishly walked towards the door, grabbing his shirt from the chair he had thrown it on last night. He had not even bothered to take off more than that and his boots before going to bed. Well, that and his armor of course.

"I'm taking a shower, Dax," he muttered while pulling the shirt over his head.

"Sure, take your time!" the ottsel said and waved at his friend's back.

As soon as the door closed, the little one began walking in circles, muttering about never getting a moment's rest. Oh well, fate of the hero and all that. At least the reward had been worth all the trouble, last time. With a loving smile he patted the leg of his new pants.

'-'

"They need to speed these things up! Or at least have a movie to watch! There's enough empty space for a movie player, right? Yeah, exactly! Would it hurt so much to make these benches a little more comfortable, too? I mean, the Baron hasn't been in charge for ages, and I really thought Ashelin knew soft stuff, if you get my drift. But nooo, they leave us with these cold, hard blocks of metal to sit on. And also, don't you think that there could at least be a window that's possible to look out through…"

The driver of the air train was very grateful for the ability to close off the window to the passenger room. He squinted his eyes at the approaching desert island ahead, silently wondering how in all flaming hells the blonde man in the back could remain sane with that blabbering moron of an ottsel around him all the time.

Currently, the answer was quite simple.

"… or a game to play, or something to read! Not that I ever could finish a book, but a comic book! Or some music! Really, how can the driver stand this boredom? I bet they've got loads of fun in the driver's cabin… man, I miss Tess. She was in tears when I took off tonight, I tell you … hey! Are you listening?"

Jak did not reply, sitting hunched forwards with his arms resting on the morph gun in his lap.

"Jak?"

Daxter strutted closer on the bench and leaned in to check on his friend's face. Jak's eyes were closed, and now that he finally shut up for a moment, Daxter heard the low snores.

"Oho, that's really sensitive, man," Daxter said, pulling back and sourly crossing his arms, "so I bore you, is that it? You fall asleep as soon as I start talking?"

But even the ottsel had to pause and think about the last sentence a bit, because if that rule applied then Jak definitely would be sleeping a whole lot more. And at very crucial moments, too.

"Anyway!" Daxter started again as he had nudged his brain for a little while, "Sig's gonna kill you if he finds you sleeping on the job. Don't count on me protecting you from him!"

He clambered onto Jak's shoulder and began pushing at the hanging head.

"Mmf… we're not there yet…" Jak muttered, unmoving.

"No, but you better seem a little more alert then. Sheez!"

Daxter leant against Jak's hair, gesticulating his left arm around as he continued to rant.

"Haven't I taught you anything about making a good impression? You've got to make sure they know where they've got you, like I do, otherwise you get no respect. You know, walk straight, look 'em in the eye and…"

But Jak had already fallen asleep again.

About an hour later when they finally landed outside of Spargus, Jak marched out of the air train cab fully awake with the morph gun resting on one shoulder, and an annoyed ottsel on the other. Sig watched them come towards him, casually leaning against the frame of the Gila Stomper with his Peace Keeper by his side.

While the giant did look perfectly calm, he was feeling quite uneasy – which was an unfamiliar and not too pleasant experience for him. Despite this he was determined to go through with the task given to him.

Give the kid some time to chill out, don't drop everything on him at once. If he still needed to cope with his father's death, then he would be given a chance to do so. A little fighting that had nothing to do with the fate of the world should be a good start. It would serve as a nice warm-up for what laid ahead.

The uneasy feeling gave way for a grin.

Oh yes, Keira did not even know half of it, but if what the wastelanders had in mind did not cheer Jak up, then nothing would.

Sig mentally shook his head and focused on the approaching couple.

"Hey there, heavy dozer," he said and gave a small wave of his hand, just enough to be seen in the lights from the city.

Jak waved back in a similar manner. At that moment Daxter decided to hop off and skittle over the last few yards of sand. He leapt into the waiting vehicle and sat down in the back, resolutely crossing his arms.

"I'm not talking to Jak!" he announced for anybody who had the misfortune to listen.

Sig studied him for a second, processing this bit of strange information.

"Great," he finally said, "don't talk to me either."

He turned to Jak, just as the much shorter elf stopped beside the driver's seat side of the Stomper.

"I take it you're driving?" Sig said, grinning.

Jak lifted the morph gun from his shoulder and heaved it into the back of the vehicle, barely missing Daxter. He was feeling much, much better after getting a little more sleep. The cool air of the wasteland night washed away the last specks of exhaust and energized him.

"Let's rock," he said and hopped in behind the wheel.

"You said it!"

"Just don't fall asleep while you're steering!" Daxter piped up.

Sig tried to drop the Peace Maker on him.

'-'

It was a rather disappointing trip to the ruins, really. After weeks in the desert Jak could have gone there with his eyes closed, the wind remained only irritating at worst and there were no marauders in sight. After a while, the lack of attackers made Jak curious enough to ask Sig if they had all been blown away in the last storm.

The giant shrugged.

"We haven't seen any of them since that space-spider stomped all over the place," he said, "guess they're busy washing their underwear."

"Wimps!" Daxter cheered from the back.

Jak smirked, while Sig threw a disdainful glance over his shoulder at the ottsel.

"What's that look supposed to mean, huh?" Daxter demanded.

Sig did not even bother to answer that, and turned his head forwards again.

As he drove, Jak caught himself scanning the ground they passed. The pale moonlight and the Stomper's headlights frequently slid across dark stains in the sand and on partly dissolved rocks; marks from Erol's journey across the wasteland. The storms had yet to bury the wounds of the ground. The footprints on the mountainsides would probably remain for years to come. Not to mention the rubble of dark maker metal littering the area about a kilometer from Spargus' walls. That would probably be cleaned up as soon as Seem and his band of monks got around to do so, however. Always something.

Jak pursed his mouth and fixed his eyes on the area ahead of them, trying to avoid the thought that the ground could be lucky to not have as many scars as he did. If he allowed himself to think such things he was just begging for far darker thoughts to resurface.

Soon the hulking remains of the ruined city came into view, and Jak drove up to the mountain range on the western side of the ruins. He parked the Stomper where it should be safe from at least the worst wind, and turned off the engine. Darkness fell like a wet cloth – except that it was not moist and weighed nothing. When the lights of the vehicle died, the men's vision plummeted. A low fizzling sound was heard as Sig adjusted the infrared night vision of his goggle, but he still remained still and waited for Jak's eyes to adjust.

Daxter blindly – with irritated mutters and a lot of stumbling – climbed onto Jak's shoulder.

"Uhm, so…" the ottsel whispered as he had found his way to his goal, "are you going to tell us about what we're up against?"

Sig reached to the back of the Stomper and grabbed what laid there. By then Jak had recovered enough to take the offered morph gun from his friend's hands.

"Why spoil the surprise?" the giant asked, smirking while he changed the setting on his weapon to a quicker rate of fire than the one he usually preferred.

Jak's teeth reflected a tiny beam of moonlight as he grinned.

"Nooo…" Daxter groaned and tried to crawl into his partner's hair.

"Gimme a little credit, Daxter!" Sig snorted, "I wouldn't send you two into something without a warning if I didn't think Jak could handle it."

He leant in a little closer and muttered in a conspirator's tone:

"Watch it, they're quick buggers."

"Eek!" Daxter eeped.

Jak simply set the morph gun to arc weilder. If they were quick to get up to him, they would get a surprise. Of course, he would be seen like a beacon in the dark, but metal heads tended to find their way to him regardless of his weapon of choice. Therefore it really did not matter.

His sight had grown accustomed to the darkness, at least enough for him to be satisfied. Every fiber in his body was itching to get onto the battlefield.

"Let's go," he said and stepped out of the Stomper.

"I'll go that way," Sig said, pointing northwards.

He paused for a moment, then added:

"Most skull gems wins?"

It really was no question.

"You're on," Jak said with a wider grin.

The sand whispered dryly beneath the men's feet as they took off towards the ruins.

Jak slowed down as he came closer to the first wall, and instead sneaked up to it as silently as he could. Holding his gun ready, he stopped and strained his ears. Daxter held his breath.

Nothing. Only the wind blowing through the hollow windows and moving the sand around.

"Ready?" Jak whispered.

Daxter's only reply was a loud gulp. Despite the lack of verbal reply, the "not talking to Jak" deal was officially off, and neither of them even thought about it.

Cautiously Jak slipped around the wall and followed the next one around the corner, keeping his senses open for any kind of threat. A metal head with a skull gem could easily be seen in the dark, but he knew from experience that not all of them were equipped with that feature.

He also had two options on this. He could do it the hard way and sneak around until he found something, or he could activate his eco powers and let _them_ find _him_. But he was not rash enough to do something like that before he knew what kind of metal heads he were up against, especially since these were tampered by life in the wasteland.

Damas would be pleased to hear tha- oh no, don't go there.

"Do you hear that?" Daxter whispered, distracting Jak from a slam of bad thoughts.

'Thanks, pal.'

Jak narrowed his eyes and strained his ears further. Just the wind… no… there was a hissing sound, mingling with the wind until they were almost impossible to tell apart. His lips drew back in a small grin.

'Come and get me, if you dare.'

Skittering of thousands of feet across the sand, a hissing whirlwind of tiny noises, and a dry smack against the hard grains. Jak spun around and fired, sending a blast of pure blue energy upwards.

Shriek, thump.

The shining skull gem fell out of its socket and slid across the sand as the body fell apart in blobs of dark eco.

"One," Jak muttered.

"Uhm, Jak buddy?" Daxter whispered, urgently.

"Yeah, I hear them."

From all directions came the hissing sound, and it sounded a lot more angry now. They were coming, fast.

No use holding back, then.

Jak quickly set the morph gun to rest mod and with a low whirring the weapon pocketed itself down to a very basic form, taking up a lot less space.

"Hang on," Jak said as he hung the gun on his back.

If Daxter replied, his friend did not hear it. Skull gems glowed in the night, flitting back and forth in a wild fury as their owners dashed through the night towards the antagonist. He was already transforming.

It used to frighten him, and even now when he could control it, letting the dark eco free within him would never be a pleasant experience. Fangs cut his gum while the claws sliced through the skin of his fingers, hungry for the tough flesh of the metal heads. That were the least unpleasant things.

His skin tingled momentarily – _eugh__ get it over with, hurry! _– the last warning of Jak's body before every pore on his skin opened and impure eco oozed out, covering every inch of him in a thin layer of oily darkness.

The skull gems came ever closer, but they seemed to be slowing down by the second. Jak clutched his head, the eco seeping into his skin while his mind clogged up.

Kill.

So simple.

They move. Slash. Screech. No move.

Floating eco. So sweet. Delicious. Like blood.

Their blood.

Pain! Arm! DIE!

Screech. Scream. So sweet.

Gunfire. Who? Sig… who? No matter.

Kill. Slice. Bite. Their blood. My blood. So sweet.

So sweet. Come. More blood. Scream more. Die more!

COME!

About an hour later, Sig found the man and the ottsel with the help of the skull gems' glow. Daxter busied himself with throwing all the gems in a pile, while Jak sat with his back against a worn down wall. He was partly illuminated by the weak glow of the gems, but shadows veiled his eyes.

"I count fifty-seven!" Daxter cheerfully called as he noticed the approaching giant.

"I got forty-three," Sig said, "but, I found their nest and blasted the eggs."

"That still won't earn you skull points!"

Sig gave an indifferent shrug, forgetting that he could not be seen that well in the dusk. He turned to the other one in the duo.

"Jak? You okay?"

"Mmf."

The blonde straightened up and pressed a hand to his forehead.

"Jus' used too m'ch eco. Gives m'a headache."

Sig came closer and hunched down in front of his friend. That was when he noted the dark stain on Jak's left upper arm. While there were spots of metal head blood, those were a lot lighter even in the poor illumination. Seemed like something had gotten its teeth above his protective gear.

"What about that?" the bigger man asked and pointed.

"Healed it. Just blood."

Jak reached for the stain and brushed it off, cakes of dried blood raining down in the sand. It did seem that there was nothing left beneath it which could gush out more of the red fluid.

For a moment, Sig silently watched the smaller man before him. He wished that he could have blamed the reduced speaking on the headache the blonde had mentioned, but even then it seemed like Jak spoke a lot less than usual. Even by his normal standards. And Sig, already told that things were not that good, only saw proof.

He stood up.

"Seems like we're done here," he declared, "let's go back home then. I'll drive."

"Mmf."

Jak got to his feet, and Daxter immediately scurried over and up onto the waiting shoulder.


	5. The sun on the horizon

_Author's note:_ Thanks to everyone who reviewed! I'm very happy that you like my story, and don't worry, there's much more to come. I'll just briefly comment on a couple of questions that have been raised before we hop to the next chapter.

Syvia – Cool, I have old time fans? Neat!

Light-Eco-Sage – Ya know, I think I'll go with Keira's opinion of not wanting to know about the tail thing. Maybe he was trying to hide, though… yeah, that sounds reasonable. What? I'm not copping out! Hey!

Shir-ran – I'm very honored, don't worry ;)

Toboe's pup – Well, considering that Damas died three days ago in this fic, I at least feel that Jak has the right to still be hurting. 'Course, that's my opinion.

N.Y.A.I – It wasn't the key that Jakwas afraid of, per se, but the reflection of water and the metal reminded him of all the needles Praxis and Erol plugged into him when he was tortured. I guess I need to try harder to make that point, which is good to know.

kyanightdragon – Patience, patience… good things only get better with a little wait.

Everyone else, thank you again for your support.

Enough rambling, chapter time!

Chapter 5, Morning sunlight

Somewhere along the way back towards Spargus, Jak's eyes slid shut and he leant back against his seat, braving the bumpy ride for a short nap.

"Aw no, not again!" Daxter complained as he noticed what was going on, "one of these days you're gonna be dumped in the middle of nowhere if you keep doing that!"

Sig glanced to his right to discover the reason for Daxter's complaining, and a small grin appeared on his face. He turned the wheel and steered towards the high dunes to the west, vaguely seen in the fading moonlight.

"Hey! City's that way!" Daxter called, pointing towards the horizon, "you're not really going to dump him out here, are you?"

"Nah, just taking a detour," Sig said without looking around.

"Detour? What detour? There's no road to close!"

"Shut up or I'll skin you alive with your own bones."

In the face of a very real threat, Daxter decided that it might be good to follow such a blasphemous order just for once. It was quite a painful ordeal, however.

Eventually Sig hit the brakes atop the highest dune he could find, and stood up on his seat to check on things properly.

The air remained still apart from a mild breeze, and there was no smell of an approaching storm. No lamps from marauder vehicles either – it seemed like the rats were still hiding in fear inside their holes.

Perfect.

He turned off the engine and looked ahead, towards the horizon which now had begun to fill up with a warm splay of yellow.

Satisfied, Sig sat back down and poked Jak's shoulder.

"Hey, chili pepper. Wake up."

"Mmgrshh…?"

Jak straightened up, yawning and rubbing his eyes with one hand.

"Whazzit?" he muttered.

Daxter leaped forwards, reclaiming his seat on Jak's shoulder to get a proper look on the scenery before them.

"Oooh, look at the pretty colors…" the ottsel said.

Jak blinked a few times before his vision completely cleared, but as it did he looked in the same direction as his companions and remained quiet.

Crossing his arms, Sig leant against the backrest of his seat with a slanted smile on his lips.

The sun steadily rose above the horizon, spreading a red shimmer across the western sky and setting the sand of the wasteland on fire. Streaks of purple clouds floated on the intensifying ocean of red and yellow, while the stars went out one by one. The gleam of the sand intensified by the minute, only here and there prickled by cacti and their growing shadows.

It was breathtaking, even as the audience had to shield their eyes when the light became too intense. Watching the natural wonder of colors, it was for a moment difficult to remember what a sorry place the world was. In the embrace of the new day, things seemed so much easier to bear.

The two men and the ottsel watched nature's fleeting masterpiece in a rare silence.

But eventually, the sun left the horizon completely, and the sky began to return to its blue dress. The fresh feeling remained in the for once gentle winds, however.

Sig realized that his time had run out, and with an inward sigh he began searching through his list of ways to begin the conversation. None of them seemed satisfying this time either. Charging this one head on just did not work.

It was frustrating beyond words.

"Hey, Jak," he finally settled on.

"Hmm?" the blonde warrior murmured, still pleasantly trapped in the morning peace.

"Well I…"

Damn, this was going to take a good chunk of pride, which he had been saving for some special occasion.

Then again, this was probably one of the few really, really good reasons he would ever have to sacrifice his pride.

"… I wanted to tell you I'm sorry," he finished, staring straight ahead at the cooling horizon.

Jak and Daxter both turned their heads in confusion.

"For what?" Jak said, for once making it before Daxter started asking stupid questions.

Sig reached up and rubbed his chin as he desperately tried to find the right, or if nothing else then the least wrong words, again.

Shit, shit, shit. This was_ really_ not his forte! Damn that little Keira for dragging him into this, and damn himself for feeling guilty enough to let her drag him into it.

"I started thinking, after you told me your backstory and all that the other night, after the big kaabloie…"

Oh yes, that was about what they had managed to do after seeing the precursors' off, before that call for help.

_"Whaddaya mean yer THE Mar?__ THAT Mar? Damas' Mar? I don't recall giving ye any dream grass to chew on, poppy…"_

The disbelief then had at least been better than the reactions to the news about Damas. Jak stared down at his hands, gritting his teeth. Daxter worriedly watched him, his tiny hairy ears hanging down along his face. Of course Sig noticed this, but he still pressed on to get the worst over with. It could only get better on the other side.

Either way it did appear that Keira had been right about Jak not at all doing well about the matter. Sig had never seen the blonde's grim face so pale.

"You asked me what Damas had me looking for in Haven," the bigger man said, "and…"

He sighed.

"You get my drift. Had I told you… well. If he had known then Damas would have just broke through all the rubble in Haven even harder, but…"

Grunting in frustration, he rubbed his face with a gloved hand. He felt like a complete idiot trying to do something he was never meant to. Knowing that things were not going well, he gave up trying to make amends and steered onto safer hunting grounds; facts.

"You better not be doing something stupid like blaming yourself for it, you hear?" he said, "after all you did for Spargus, giving you a hand once in a while was the least anyone of us could do. I heard you were in some tightass situation."

Daxter had only been listening for a long time, and that combined with Jak's bone hard face made his tension spring free right at that moment.

"Tell me about it!" he said, waving his arms like a lunatic, "huge dark nasties with big black needles boring down on us, I thought we were goners for sure! Right Jak?"

_Aiming at me can't move what do you want tied down cold metal the pain is coming somebody please help needles dripping is that my blood can't remember only it hurts HURTS **HURTS**!_

Jak dug his nails into his palms and the pain forced him back to there and then. Somehow he managed to bluntly nod. He turned away, hoping that the runaway memories had not shown in his eyes.

Sig and Daxter exchanged bewildered glances. For a moment Jak's face had turned pale as ashes, but as he looked in another direction the color began to return to him. Sig shortly debated with himself, but finally chose to pretend that he had not noticed anything. He was quite amazed when Daxter also let it slip.

Hell, the fuzzy guy had watched his best friend mourn his father just a few days ago. Not even Daxter could be expected to be that devoid of empathy.

"Yeah," Sig picked up again, "Damas was really impressed by your skills. For a newcomer like you there wouldn't normally be any mercy after what happened between us in the arena."

He raised his hand and poked at Jak's shoulder panzer.

"And all these bits of armor he let you have," Sig said, "I think that somewhere deep down he sort of knew that you're his son."

With great satisfaction he noted that the blonde's hands began to unclench, ever so slowly.

"Or if he didn't, then he damn well wished so hard that he wanted to believe it," Sig added.

Jak opened his eyes.

"You don't have to believe me of course, chili pepper, but I knew Damas and he sure had me reporting on your past in Haven whenever you weren't listening. He never showed that much interest in a rookie before, he must've felt there was something between the two of you."

Jak straightened up.

"Are ya listening to this Jak?" Daxter said, crossing his arms, "we're finally getting some credit!"

"Yeah…"

The murmur was accompanied by a small, sheepish grin appearing on Jak's lips.

Sig had been pondering telling the youngster that Damas' body had been recovered from Haven and that there would be a funeral soon. But there was no reason to ruin the lifted spirits he could proudly claim to have built up in Jak.

'Damn, I'm good!'

"So, that's that," Sig said aloud and gave Jak a light punch on the shoulder, "now let's get back before Keiver decides we're dead and starts claiming our change of clothes."

"He'll have to drop a few pounds before he could use 'em though!" Daxter happily pointed out.

"He'd probably clean the lizard stables with Jak's," Sig smirked and turned the engine key.

"Not if he likes his teeth," Jak said, grin growing wider.

"If he keeps abusing toothpaste like he currently does, then that won't be an option for revenge, buddy boy! Phew!"

Daxter waved his hand before his nose, pulling a disgusted face at the memory. Chuckling, Sig released the handbrake and steered down the hill. They rolled onto more level ground and continued towards Spargus.

As the high stone wall of the city came into view, Sig glanced at Jak. The grin had melted away by then, but the youngster definitely looked a lot more at peace than he had done for a long time.

Sig returned his gaze to their destination, trying to maintain a neutral look though he really wanted to grin like a fool for what he knew the future held.

'Hold your yakows, Jak, we're not done with you yet.'


	6. It's a brand new day

_Author's note:_ I'm kind of scared of this chapter. But here we go.

Chapter 6, Strange new day

The gate opened before them and Sig steered inside, masterfully turning the Stomper around and backing up against the wall.

"Nice driving," Daxter commented while leaping out of the vehicle, "couldn't have done it better myself."

Sig refrained from commenting. Instead he stepped outside and stretched.

"Ahh, nothing like starting the day by smashing metal heads before sunrise!" he concluded.

As he lifted his morph gun from the back seat, Jak had to grin in agreement.

"Only way it could be better would've been if you'd left me a few eggs to scramble," he said.

Sig just grinned and shrugged.

Jak looked upwards. The colors of the sunrise had melted away for the clear blue sky, with only a few wisplike clouds accenting the azure.

Yes, strange as it seemed the world did have its beautiful moments.

Heavy steps snapped him from his thoughts and he turned around. The calm tore away as his eyes narrowed at the approaching muscle mountain of an elf.

"Back so soon, boy?" Kleiver said.

Jak's reply was drowned when Daxter hopped onto his shoulder with a smug look on his face.

"Hey there, Venal, how's life treating you?" the ottsel said.

"It's… Veger…" came the weak reply from just beside Kleiver's head.

"Oh phu-lease! Look at him, Jak! Not even two days and he's already in a fetal position. Pff."

For a long time, Jak had been fully aware that there were a lot of things far worse than death. Despite this, Veger's wild eyes reinforced this knowledge and made it all so much sweeter. Oh yes, there _was_ something better than ripping the bastard's heart out and smash it into his face.

"You blokes better have cleaned the ruins out good, 'cause me and me boys are going to get a few more leaper lizards today," Kleiver said, waving his own Peace Maker at Jak's face, "and I don't want to see a single worm."

"Fat chance," Jak said, giving Veger a nasty look, "but if you do, you could always trade them something."

Veger eeped, but nobody had any sympathy.

During this conversation, Sig glanced over Kleiver's massive shoulder towards the row of dune vehicles on the other side of the parking area. A small head crowned by teal-green hair cautiously peeked up above the back of a Sand Shark. In front of the vehicle stood a box of working equipment and a small heap of engine parts. It appeared that Keira had found something to do while waiting for the result of Sig's talk with Jak, but how she had talked Kleiver into letting her poke at his beloved machines would be an interesting story to hear. The wastelander sent her a grin and nodded, which caused a wide smile of relief to take over her features.

That was when the gate to the city itself opened. Sig looked up, and stiffened slightly. Keira noticed this and followed his gaze in confusion. She received no better knowledge from this study.

Nobody else seemed to notice the person entering the area, leaning against a wanderer's staff to even out her staggering stride.

"Nah, I'm saving this one," Kleiver said, motioning at the trembling Veger.

"When you decide to make a snack of him, let me watch," Jak replied, grinning even more evilly.

"Maybe if ya get me a couple of them leaping lizards…"

"Kleiver!" Sig sharply said.

"What?"

Kleiver glared at Sig for disturbing such an enlightening discussion, but turned to look when the other wastelander nodded to the side. The remains of his eyebrows twitched.

"Morning there, Madame," he said, lightly bowing his head while moving his free hand in a wide arc.

It was one of the worse parodies of a bow that the world had ever seen. Despite this, he backed off when the woman nodded at him to move.

Jak looked at her with idle curiosity.

"Ohh, another scary one!" Daxter concluded in a far too loud whisper, "and this one ain't even pretty."

Which was very true, though tactlessly spoken.

When she was younger she might have been beautiful, but like almost all the other wastelanders – men and women alike – Jak had seen, scars from battle crossed her face. Her lips were split at two places, and the left eye was hidden beneath an eye patch. Years in the desert had worn on her skin, which now appeared leathery.

What could be seen of her left arm, holding the staff she supported herself on, was in no better condition. The other arm was completely hidden in the long sleeve of her light, worn dress.

Probably to protect her head against the sun she had wrapped her hair up in a rough wool scarf, pulled down far enough to obscure her eyebrows.

She met Jak's gaze with hard eyes – not cold, but steely.

The woman completely ignored Daxter's comment and turned to Sig.

"Are you done?" she asked.

"Piece of cake, once we got them to crawl out," he reported.

"Good, good…"

She turned her head again, and narrowed her eyes at Jak. He scowled back. Yet another one who needed to work on making a good first impression. At least she had not called him an amateurish wannabe yet.

"And you would be Jak, of course," she said.

Here we go again. He crossed his arms, inwardly growling.

"Who's asking?"

Had he not been busy giving Veger warning glares o' Doom, Kleiver would have cackled at the familiar question. The shirt-wearing ottsel stood up on his "partner's" shoulder, a lot more alive than he had been in the last two days – but Kleiver's look kept his mouth shut.

"I've got something to do, so I'll mosey…" Sig said to the world in general.

He hefted the Peace Maker on his shoulder and headed towards the entrance to the city, giving Kleiver an exhorting look. The vehicle master hesitated to miss a good show, but finally shrugged and turned to follow Sig.

The gate closed behind them.

"I've seen you in the arena," the woman said.

"Yeah, I think most people here have done that," Jak replied, impatiently.

"We still didn't catch your name, Miss zigzag face," Daxter said.

Not even as she spoke did her gaze leave Jak's face.

"That's Madame to you, rodent," she said.

"I'm not a Madame!"

She moved her staff to her other hand, and when the right hand emerged from the long sleeve it was revealed that only a pair of stumps remained of her little and ring finger. Daxter, of course, never missed a chance to drop a comment about anybody.

"Ew, nasty…"

The woman kept ignoring him, watching Jak for another moment. Then suddenly her left hand shot forwards like an attacking snake, too quickly for even the battle hardened warrior to react.

"Hey!" Jak protested.

He broke away, but not before she had managed to turn his head to the side. His chin even throbbed from the pinch.

"Watch it, do ya know what happened to the last guy who grabbed him like that?" Daxter said, wagging a finger at the offending lady, "he got smashed, mechanized and blown to teeny tiny pieces of creepo by yours truly."

"Just what do you want?" Jak snarled.

From her hiding place, Keira watched the scene unfold with growing worry. She debated stepping forwards, but was unsure whether that would help or not. The situation seemed so askew that she could not tell what was really going on, as lost as Jak and Daxter were. Furthermore, she had stayed in hiding so far because she did not want Jak to realize that she was the one getting Sig to talk with him. She wanted Sig's action to appear as sincere as possible, and exposing her role in it might just make Jak doubt that his wastelander friend had really cared.

The woman, meanwhile, turned away so that the eye patch obscured the only possible eye contact. Pressing her ripped lips so tightly against each other that the skin turned white, she momentarily lowered her head.

"My name's Elda," she finally said, "I-"

"See? That wasn't so hard, now was it?" Daxter interjected.

Elda grunted something, lifting her hand to rub her forehead beneath the cloth. Suddenly she looked very tired.

"Damas' death shook Spargus very hard," she said, "but, none of us doubt that he died like the warrior he wanted to be until the bitter end."

Jak swallowed hard to rid his mouth of the bitter taste. He had thought that it would leave him alone for a while, but this woman only reopened the wound which Sig had tried to help him stitch together.

"Look, I- I'm…" he started, grasping for something to tell her.

He could not even decide whether to be angry anymore, not when she leaned so heavily on her staff, as if the grief for a lost king was about to make her fall. But as he stumbled on his words, she straightened up and sharply looked at him.

"Sorry?" she said, "I don't blame you. Damas did only what he wanted to."

"How much longer is this going to take? I want to get back home to my sweet Tessy…" Daxter muttered.

This finally earned him Elda's attention, at least.

"Did anyone ever tell you the meaning of patience?" she asked, lightly shaking her staff at the ottsel.

"Oh yeah, many times," Daxter said and proudly crossed his arms, "I never listened to Samos' lectures, though. And I still became a precursor, so ha!"

"Look," Jak said, "I don't like talking about what happened, so if you'd-"

"I do have something important to tell you, boy," Elda interrupted him.

She closed her visible eye and shook her head.

"Just… give me a minute…"

"We've given you plenty already!" Daxter said.

Elda massaged her temple as if she was starting to develop a headache, but began speaking again.

"The last few weeks have been insane-" she started.

"Tell us about it!"

"… Yes, you two would know better than anyone."

She straightened up and glared at Jak again. He felt more impatient by the second, but her strange actions still managed to spark a small feeling of curiosity deep down inside him. Therefore he let her continue without interrupting.

"On top of all the attacks, we learn that the precursors are a bunch of silly rats-"

"Hey!"

"- and now, there are rumors flying around that Damas' son is still alive."

Jak's fists clenched, and he did not even notice it. Elda studied him, if possibly even more intently than before.

"The people of Spargus held a meeting last night and in the end I was given the task to investigate the rumors. Now, some say they overheard the Haven people explaining that it's you who we should call our heir."

She looked him over, eyes hardening again.

"But Mar should be five years old, and unless you are the biggest warrior child in the world it can't be you," she said.

Jak opened his mouth, but he did not even know where to start.

"Even if you are disappointingly short, if you are somehow Damas' son," Elda added.

Bingo. He had known that there would be something.

"It's not the size that matters!" Daxter protested and patted Jak's hair, "trust me, lady, I know!"

"I never said that your friend is weak," Elda retorted.

"Short, weak, it's all the same."

Daxter paused for a moment, then smacked his hands over his mouth.

"Crap! Now I sound like Pecker!"

"Anyway!" Elda sharply said and turned back to Jak, "I asked Sig, and he told me what you told him. Now I ask you, is such a crazy story true or did you drink too much cacti beer before the bedtime stories?"

Jak shook his head.

"Kor, the precursor stone, a kid and timetravel?" he said, "was that what Sig told you?"

"That's a hefty summary, but it sounds familiar," Elda said, "though I don't see any proof."

"Kor gave us the whole story, we kicked his ass and then sent junior and newbie-Samos back in time so that mini-Jak could grow up like he should," Daxter said, "sheez, what more do you want, lady?"

But Elda had returned to ignore him and focused her entire mind on Jak again. Giving up, he began digging in his pockets.

"This is the amulet Damas gave me when he asked me to find his son," he said, speaking through his teeth to keep his voice steady.

_Damas__' dead body father is dead and I never-_

With all his will power he forced the memories back under control, but his fingers still trembled slightly around the strangely shaped trinket. He handed it to Daxter after taking heed of Elda's slow nod, and then reached into another pocket, withdrawing a similar amulet.

"This is mine," he said, "it's the same that the young me wore."

He glared at Elda, the painful subject raising his shackles all at once.

"Happy now?" he growled, "proof enough?"

She did not reply, instead she reached out her still complete hand and carefully touched the amulet with her fingertips.

"Hey!" Daxter impatiently said, "done yet? I'm itching to get back!"

"Yes, I'm almost done…" Elda said, her voice suddenly soft.

She met Jak's mildly surprised gaze again, a smile spreading over her torn lips.

"I'm sorry, I lied to you," she said and reached upwards, "while there are rumors flying I did this questioning all on my own accord."

With a swift pull she ripped the scarf away from her head, revealing a burr of darkly green hair and a pair of eyebrows in the same color.

"Damas used to be blonde when he was younger," she said, "I guess you got that part from him."

Jak felt as if he had forgotten how to breathe, staring at the woman in front of him with his mouth falling agape.

'What the hell is she saying…'

"No frickin' way!" Daxter squeaked.

Her smile unwavering, Elda reached into a pocket of her own and withdrew a small circle with a plate on, all made in warmly orange precursor metal. She turned the ring to reveal the plate as bearing the familiar Seal of Mar.

"He gave me this on our wedding. Proof enough, Mar?"

The morph gun hit the ground.

"Mo… ther…?"

Tears welled up in Elda's eye and she nodded, forming a silent "yes" with trembling lips.

Jak could only stare at her, his hands awkwardly rising up but falling back again, helpless to know how to handle this new situation. It seemed like Elda did however, as she stepped forwards, slowly only at first. Daxter made use of his survival instincts and leaped away from Jak's shoulder before the hug ensued. The staff hit the ground beside the morph gun.

It took Jak a moment to wrestle his mind back into gear, at least enough to automatically wrap his arms around Elda's back. Her left hand found its way to his cheek while her tears continued to wet his armor, and despite the rough skin the touch sparked something far down in his mind. Not enough to be a memory, but maybe the memory of a memory, not visual but just the recalling of his skin feeling that very hand.

It was too much.

All the pain he had forced down after Damas' death wrung him over and his face crashed against Elda's shoulder, the first tears since he was ten years old breaking through his defenses.

Two people clutching each other as sobs racked them, forgetting everything else but the realization that they were not alone.

And behind the Sand Shark, Keira curled up against the hot stone wall, pressing a hand against her smiling lips while tears flooded down her cheeks. She had never seen anything so beautiful.


	7. The ones left behind

_Author's note:_ What I meant with being scared of the last chapter is that I'm frightened of the thought of creating a possible Mary Sue. People tell me that Elda is okay though, and I hope I can keep it that way. :)

Chapter 7, Memories

It was difficult at first, once they calmed down. How do you communicate with somebody you thought dead, one you dared not even think about? Especially for Jak, who never had regarded himself as good with words, it was a mountain to climb.

Elda, too, had problems after the tears ceased to fall and logic began its dirty work. They had to find a whole new set of rules for existence, since both of them were facing a living ghost.

Sitting in the shadow of the wall they attempted to figure out how to speak with each other, while Daxter produced tissue after tissue from nowhere and blew his nose over and over again while loudly proclaiming how touched he was. Nobody minded him.

They sought for words for several awkward moments, until finally Elda made the first attempt. Jak felt quite relieved about that.

"I understand that you grew up in the past," she said, "how was that?"

She demanded of him to talk, of course. He sent out the tip of his tongue to wet his lips, still feeling nervous. But at least now he had a mission. Grabbing hold of that familiar definition, he sought for a good way to begin.

"The world was different," he said, "a lot greener. There was even a jungle about where the center of Haven is now. And all we had to worry about were rampant lurkers."

"And dark eco!" Daxter pointed out.

"Yeah, yeah," Jak said, nodding, "that too."

"You're sure sounding nonchalant about it!"

Jak pulled his knees up against his chest, narrowing his eyes thoughtfully while ignoring Daxter.

"There were many different kinds of eco, too," he said, "not just light and dark."

"That so…"

Elda tilted her head, watching him with her only eye.

"Sounds like a pretty place," she said, "do you miss it?"

Jak realized that she could care less about the weather report from a few hundred years ago, but it felt so much easier to talk in general terms than to talk about the one he used to be. He had been innocent then, before Praxis, before Erol, before Krew, and before Kor. It was painful to think about how simple and pure things had been, now that they were long lost.

But he had to. He did not know the woman sitting beside him, and she did not know him. And he desperately needed to change that. Finally there was something that validated his existence, something he did not have to fight for or turn the world upside down searching for. Family… such a strange word, but he had always wondered what it would be like – a lifelong question severed and bleeding all over his soul when Damas uttered his final request.

Well, there had been his "uncle" in Sandover village, but they had of course never been family for real. The aging explorer had been the only grown elf in the village who understood the adventurous spirit in the blonde child, and they had shared a kind of bond. But it was weak; the man always planning for his next trip and leaving the small Jak longing for his stories about exploration.

'You're not going to leave me too, are you?' he thought, watching Elda from the corner of his eye.

It felt strange to look at her, she should have felt more familiar than she did. Huh.

Jak realized that the silence dragged on, and picked up the conversation again.

"I used to think it was boring, a lot of the time," he said, staring ahead, "it was a good place, but not for… somebody like me."

It still felt awkward, but he forced himself to turn his head and look straight at Elda. The corner of her lips tilted upwards, and she placed her left hand on his, resting on the ground between them.

"Damas would've been prouder than he already was," she said, rolling her eye with a soft sigh, "of course, you would've had an even harder time dragging it out of him. And, I am proud of you."

Though still unsure of what he could do, Jak turned his hand over and entwined his fingers with Elda's. Her smile widened a little more.

"To finally hear your voice, and to know what you have become – while short!"

She smirked as Jak snorted. Daxter interrupted her as she was about to continue.

"Our boy here didn't start to talk before coming back to Haven, though," the ottsel informed, "and his first words really set his new theme!"

"Really," Elda said, looking back at Jak, "what did you say?"

He struggled for a moment – that instance was far too close to the darkest time in his life. Thankfully, Daxter saved him. Now that was an almost disturbing experience, especially since the only other time that had ever happened was during the moment they were currently discussing.

The ottsel squared his shoulders, flexed his muscles – such as they were – and put on a haughty expression.

"I'm gonna kill Praxis!" he declared in a deep Jak-impression voice.

With a few bouts of hoarse chuckles, Elda squeezed Jak's hand.

"Atta boy…" she said, grinning.

Saved the unpleasant task of repeating what had gone through his pounding head that time, Jak managed to grin a little in return.

"Stop calling me short," he said, "it could be worse."

Holding up his free hand with only an inch between his thumb and pointing finger, he continued:  
"I was _this_ close to becoming a precursor."

"Oh holy flut-fluts no."

"Hey! Don't diss the godhood!" Daxter protested.

This earned him Elda's vague interest, and she pointed at the ottsel – ignoring his cringing at her crippled hand.

"And how did this blabbering young man earn his godship, then?" she asked.

No way out of it now. Jak steeled himself.

"That's really what started everything," he began, "Dax and I went to Misty island…"

Elda silently listened, only putting in a question when Jak mentioned Gol and Maia, forgetting to explain them. He tried to take it slowly, but the memories were dulled and it was much easier to gloss over things. Now he realized that he could not even remember how Sandover had looked like from Samos' hut. The visions in his mind from way back then muddled with the more recent memories of Dead Town. He stopped trying to make a mental map and focused on the events instead.

"… and when we got back, Samos gave us a lecture-"

"All we got from Green Wrinkles back then was verbal abuse!" Daxter declared and puffed up his chest, "but nowadays he has to give me and Jak the respect we deserve."

He fell under Elda's scrutinizing gaze for a moment, and finally she gave a vague shake of her head. It was quite obvious from the look on her face that she was thinking something along the lines of "For your sake I really hope you're wrong". Despite this she let the matter drop and instead looked expectantly at Jak again. He cleared his throat and picked up again.

"Normally we could've just warped to Gol's citadel," he said, "but the warp gates were closed. That was when Keira got involved…"

"Who?" Elda inquired.

During most of the past conversation, Keira had been lying beneath the Sand Shark and redoing what she had already done to it. She felt terrible for "spying" on the conversation between Jak and his newfound mother, but she dared not move away from her hiding place. Especially not now, when they had been talking with each other for so long. It would be a nightmare of embarrassment to be discovered after all of this. As long as she kept herself busy, at least she could pretend that she was not listening in.

However, her long ears twitched when she heard her own name mentioned and despite earlier resolutions she lowered the hand holding the wrench.

'Oh, don't do this to yourself woman…'

But it did not really matter, because she could not block out the words. The small group of three was not very close to her, but the winds kept bringing the voices even closer to Keira's sharp ears.

"Samos' daughter," Jak said, "she's-"

"A total babe!" Daxter chimed in, "though she didn't know empathy back then. Holy crap!"

He vigorously shook his head at the memories.

"- a great mechanic," Jak said, looking up at the sky, "the only girl our age back there, too."

The corners of Elda's lips curled upwards again in an amused smirk. She obviously understood perfectly what that meant.

Of course, Daxter had to make sure of it.

"She never wanted to date me after I got like this though," he said and sourly crossed his arms, "she should have just known that I'm a precursor, and she would have been all over me for sure."

Under the Sand Shark, Keira rolled her eyes.

Jak watched Daxter with mildly tired eyes, until the rodent reached dangerous territory.

"But Jak here, whoa!" the ottsel told Elda, waving at the blonde, "you should have seen him when we first saw Keira in Haven- ow! Whaat?"

Keira raised an eyebrow.

"Anyway," Jak said, "we had to travel over the Fire Canyon, and Keira proposed using her zoomer to pass it. But we needed power cells for that, precursor artifacts that were kind of common back there."

He continued to speak of Misty Island, the Forbidden Jungle and Sentinel Beach, leaving behind personal relationships.

In a way, Keira felt relieved being spared listening to Jak talking about her past with him. At the same time, she was disappointed. The only reason she could return to finishing off the bullet-turning of the Sand Shark, was that she knew that she definitely would get in trouble if it was not complete when Kleiver came back.

By the time Jak had finished recounting the events before the trip above the lava, his voice had begun to grow terribly hoarse because of all the abuse. He was not at all used to talking so much.

"… so we headed towards the Canyon to give Keira the power cells."

He rounded it off with a loud clearing of his sore throat. Reaching for her staff, Elda let go of his hand and stood up.

"Sorry to strain your voice like this," she said and smiled down at him, "come on, I'll buy you a drink. I'm thirsty too."

"Sounds like a deal to me," Jak said as he stood up, "you coming, Dax?"

The ottsel furrowed his brow, delving into dangerously deep thoughts for his easy-going mind. Free drinks or go back to Tess. Then again, if he went back to Tess, they would have the entire Naughty Ottsel to themselves. Oooh, nice…

As he looked at Jak standing beside Elda, Daxter also felt a sparkle deep down; an inclination that maybe it would be good to let the two of them be alone.

"Nah, I think I'll saunter back. The heat's getting under my fur," he finally said.

Not too surprised with his friend's decision – after all, Daxter had been whining about Tess for ages – Jak hunched down and gave the ottsel a very light, friendly punch on a scrawny shoulder.

"If you see any of 'em, tell the others the good news," the blonde said with a wry smile.

"Gotcha. Have fun!"

And with that, the junior precursor spun around and dashed towards the gates. Instead of caring about them opening, he clambered the wall and disappeared on the other side.

Jak turned back to Elda, and together they headed for the city. She supported herself on the staff once again, staggering every second step. He debated asking what had happened to her, but figured it might not be the best way trying to learn about her.

"I stay out of sight most of the time," she suddenly said, shaking her head while staring ahead, "otherwise, I would have come to you on your eve of victory. But, with my… 'disability'…"

She motioned at her bad leg.

"… it's better to not be seen too much. Sig sent for me as soon as he could after hearing your story, but when they finally found me you had already left."

Turning to meet his gaze, she tried to smile a little. It failed.

"But it doesn't matter now, really… anyway, it might have been better. I was… not quite stable right then."

Jak tried to think of something, anything to say. But what could anyone reply to such a thing? Elda watched him, and finally, after what seemed like ages, turned away while shaking her head.

"No, Mar," she said, "I believe you did what you could."

"I…"

He wet his lips briefly, narrowing his eyes at the gate ahead.

"I can heal wounds, with white eco… just- just only myself. Shit!"

His fist rammed into the wall, sand falling down from the dry surface.

Such a wondrous gift, to be able to send streams of power through his body, closing near fatal wounds as long as he had charged up on light eco. But it was an egoistical gift.

Her arms snaked around his shoulders, a whole hand reaching into his hair and brushing away the dry blobs of metal head blood that still remained there.

"I'm sorry, I tore it open again," she murmured.

Pulling back, she moved her hand from his hair and grabbed his chin, a lot more gentle this time. Looking him straight in the eye, she spoke again.

"It was not your fault, Mar," she firmly said.

'Mar didn't do anything,' he thought, 'it was Jak.'

But, this was a pain they shared, even if he was the cause of it. At least, it should be easier for her. Therefore he tried to relax and listen to what she said.

"Nobody here blames you," she said, "so please don't go around doing so yourself."

'What else can I do?'

Such were his thoughts, but in reality he wanted to do what she told him. She and Sig both. Maybe over time he would manage to follow their orders. For now, he just had to pretend.

He nodded, trying to summon a braver look.

"Better," Elda said.

But there was a flicker in her eyes as she turned away. She probably saw straight through him, but at least he had tried.

In silence, they continued towards the gate, and it opened for them.

Despite the early morning there were several people walking around on Spargus' only street, and a small group of tame leaper lizards stood in a shadowy corner to the right of the gate. They perked up as the elf-duo approached.

Something needed to break the silence. Jak felt terribly awkward, knowing that he had relied on both Daxter and Elda to keep the conversations going for too long. A gap had somehow opened, and now he sought for a way to start building a bridge again. Anything would do.

"Probably a good thing that Daxter left," he said, grabbing the reigns of a lizard, "he hates these things."

"Oh?"

There was an eager hint in Elda's voice, even during that short word. The desire to fix the situation was obviously in her as well.

"Yeah, he almost got eaten once, had it not been for Seem," Jak said.

He managed to smile as Elda gave a brief chuckle. It seemed a little forced, but she managed. Feeling a bit more relieved, he got onto the lizard.

"Seem, hm? I heard from her that you beat her monks in a race," Elda said as she hooked her staff onto her back and mounted the nearest lizard.

She exchanged glances with Jak. The tense air diminished.

Two seconds later the feet of two leaper lizards smacked against the sandy streets of Spargus. Neither one of the riders paid any heed to the curses following them, shouted by wastelanders who were forced to duck or found themselves leaped over with a margin of a few inches.


	8. Unforgiving heat

_Author's note:_ Thanks to Jaxomruth for pointing out a silly mistake I had done, and now corrected. It was all Daxter's fault, anyway! He called Seem "monkboy"!

And to ChibiSess about the speed of updates; I had most of the story finished when I started posting it, so I'm just updating whenever it gets pushed off page one of the fic-list :) That's something I should do more often, really… ahem. Got a lot of stuff hanging in the air and screaming at me to work on them instead. Shh! And while this is slowly, slowly moving towards its end, the sequel is already in my head. Bad brain! Focus! … nope, it won't.

I'm also relieved to be reinformed that Elda is alright and not Sue-ish.

Oh yes, one more thing (last one, I promise, and then we can get to the story. Or you can just jump ahead, it doesn't matter), don't worry about Veger. As some great villain once said, there are things so much worse than death, after all. You may now cue insane laughter and thunder.

Da-yum, what a long author's note. Well, this is the shortest chapter of them all, so I guess it evens things out. Yup.

Chapter 8, Exhaust

Keira crawled out from her hiding place and forced herself to stand, heavily leaning against the hot Sand Shark. Her tongue was dry as a dead leaf and sweat covered her entire body, but at least she could finally move freely again. She weakly hoped that Jak and Elda could sort out their newborn troubles, but most of her mind was occupied with screaming for water.

She took a few staggering steps towards the city entrance, and flinched when the doors slid apart. However it was only Kleiver and Sig. They must have been waiting close by.

She would have sighed with relief if she had dared to waste that much breath.

"I was startin' to think ye'd died from heatstroke, hotshot," Kleiver said as he lumbered closer, "what took ye so long?"

"Double checking," Keira replied, her voice a lot more hoarse than usual.

"Spying?" Veger asked, trying to look smug, "for shame, girl…"

His weak smirk widened a little as Keira was unable to keep from cringing a little.

"Well," Kleiver said, poking a huge fingertip at the woman's moist forehead, "I'm takin' the Shark for a spin and if it ain't working well ye'll be in deep, kid."

"Doubt it," Keira said, glaring up at him as she pushed his finger aside.

"We'll see…"

And with that, Kleiver headed over to the Shark and hopped inside with surprising grace for his size. With that, I mean that the poor thing did not break apart even when the lug jumped inside it. Veger had begun chewing on his tiny claws, all smugness evaporated.

The engine roared to life, with a much smoother sound than usual. Keira grinned with a sparkle of craftsman's pride against the exhaust. Kleiver even threw her a brief glance before he steered the big vehicle out into the desert.

Sig did not wait even until the gates began to close before he placed a hand on Keira's shoulder. It was hard not to notice the feverish glimmer of her eyes.

"Come on," he said, "I'll get you something to drink."

"Thanks…"

She managed to walk beside him by her own force, but it was a stretch. Thankfully soon after they entered Spargus Sig led her up a stone stair at the side of a building. He knocked a door open and she followed, stopping only when a skeletal chair came into view. It made a dry, groaning sound as she crashed on it.

"Sheez. You almost got fried," Sig said.

A small clay bowl filled with water came into view and Keira eagerly grabbed it, emptying it in a few gulps.

When all the water was gone she lowered the bowl to her lap and loudly sighed with relief.

"I didn't want them to see me…" she finally said, shaking her head.

"Hm."

Sig took the bowl to refill it from the barrel in the corner of the sparsely decorated room. There was really just that woven chair and a stone table. An empty doorway led to a smaller room with a sleeping mat on the floor. Just a place to stay between going from point A to blow stuff apart at point B.

Keira emptied the bowl again, just a little less desperately. It was lucky that it was almost time to get another ration of water, meaning that Sig did not have to worry about sharing. As she took the third bowl, she looked up at him. Her eyes were less glassy now, thankfully.

"I hope I'm not taking up your time?" she said, slightly nervous.

"Eh? Nah."

Sig sat down on the table, crossing his arms.

"Damas just shouted 'take care of things a while' at me before he took off in a cloud o' dust," he said, looking out at the blue sky through the empty window, "I was just within sight. Elda doesn't wanna rule, with her leg it'd just be bad for moral."

Keira looked down at her reflection in the bowl. Yes, these people valued strength above all, of course they could not have a crippled leader.

The woman seen in the water was not strong, either. She closed her eyes for a moment, until Sig started talking again.

"But I guess Jak's our king now," he said, still looking at the sky.

Keira reached out and dipped her fingertip into the bowl. The reflection shattered. She moved her fingertip around to keep the image away.

"Ashelin might accept him as the true heir of Haven city, as well," she said in a low voice.

Looking up, she caught Sig's eye. Together they pondered these pieces of information.

Finally, they both shook their heads.

Not gonna happen. Jak was a soldier. He took orders, he did not give them.

It felt like a relief, in a way.

And yet…

"I… think he's going away," Keira murmured.

"What?"

She stared intently at the water, moving her hand around until the liquid almost spilled over the edge of the bowl.

"Not now, maybe, but at some point… his name is Mar. Is he the Mar who built Haven?"

"Damas named his son after that Mar," Sig said, but he was frowning.

"I understand that. But… remember that the precursors said something about things to do in the past?"

"Huh. That."

He watched her gloomy expression. It seemed to ooze out of her in an invisible cloud, spreading all over the room.

Then suddenly she shook her head and tried to smile a little.

"But we better take care of him until then," she said, "since he's out there beating down everything the rest of us can't deal with."

Raising her hand from the water, she pointed a playfully accusing and wet finger at Sig.

"And you didn't even tell me his mother was around!"

Smiling a bit, Sig pushed away from the table and headed over to the window. He placed his hand on the bottom of the square cut in the wall.

"Elda wasn't gonna accept that our chili pepper was her son just like that, so she told me to shut up about it until she was sure."

"I'm happy for him…"

Keira smiled, dropping her hand to the bowl again as her eyelids began feeling heavy. Now that her need for water had been fulfilled, she could focus on being exhausted.

Noticing this Sig motioned at the bedroom, if one could call it that.

"The next air train won't come in for a few. You should get some rest."

"Mhm… thanks."

Keira slowly drained the bowl and put it on the table. Standing up and walking across the room went better than she had thought. In the doorway she turned around and gave Sig a sleepy smile.

"Don't let Jak find me, okay?" she said.

It was not meant to be too serious.

"You can count on me," Sig said, waving his hand at her.

He turned away as she crashed on the sleeping mat.

In his view, there were still a lot of things to question in her reasoning for not being the one to help Jak. On the other hand, Jak had let Ashelin kiss him, Sig had stood and watched that himself. And if Keira knew about that, which he suspected she did… still, if she cared about Jak she should not just…

Bah. Whatever, it was none of his business, anyway. Even if Jak was like that little brother Sig never had, that was really just another reason to stay far, far away from any relationship business.

He shrugged to himself and returned to watching the street below.


	9. Toast!

_Author's note:_ Yeah, I want to know about the Mar-Jak connection as well, but since none of us will know until the next game comes along (and if I knew, I'd be sitting on my hands to keep from spreading the knowledge) I'll just have to go along with this.

Chapter 9, Raise your glass, mate

Water might be rationed to the last drop, but there are other things to drink. Especially in a town like Spargus, people sometimes needed to douse their worries with alcohol. Not that Damas had ever allowed drunkards, but considering the desperate need to survive most of the wastelanders knew to hold their liquor anyway.

The Black Oasis was located near the ocean, below one of the stone houses. The lack of sunlight kept it fairly cool, even if massive ventilation in the form of pipes leading outside were needed to keep people from choking of stale air.

The bartender looked up in surprise as the door opened and the sound of two pairs of feet – one of them irregular – coming down reached her ears. While the bar did keep open at all hours due to the varied shifts of the Spargus' population, most of the night workers had left half an hour ago and it was too early for the non-nocturnal peeps to show up.

She was even more surprised when she heard the voices before their owners came into view. The handful of remaining guests perked up as well.

"… never lost a race in my life."

"_Now_ you tell me!"

Jak's blond hair was the first thing seen in the vague illumination. A triumphant grin remained on his lips while he stepped down the last step of the stair and continued into the bar.

"Too bad for them that Kleiver and Seem didn't know that either," Elda said as she too came into view, which raised a few eyebrows.

"Not Kleiver, he was going to have Dax for a snack if I lost."

Chuckling at the memory of the look on Daxter's face, Jak hopped onto one of the barstools. He had not really meant to be cruel, but after all of his miniature friend's "You're the sidekick!" and "I wanna sit on _his_ shoulder", it had been a sweet little revenge.

"You bet your best friend in a race?"

Laughing, Elda sat down beside him.

"It wasn't my idea," Jak assured.

He turned to the barkeep.

"Morning, Etche," he said.

"Yo," she replied and then looked at Elda, "was a while, Madame."

"So it would seem. Still remember what I like?" the older woman asked with a wry smile.

The grin on the bartender's lips was almost evil.

"'Course! And you, Jak? Usual?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Sure."

"I'm paying," Elda cut in.

The woman behind the desk threw a few glances between the two, but quickly pulled herself together and whirled around to start preparing the drinks.

Elda turned her head and gave the rest of the dusky room a questioning look. A few of the other guests turned away, but most of them kept studying the odd pair. The queen smirked a little and looked back at Jak.

"Let them wonder," she said in a low voice.

"Fine with me."

He was really grateful for her decision regarding that. So much had happened in the last few days that he appreciated a chance to digest this new shocker before having to face new ones. He was fully aware that he most probably would be offered the throne of Spargus sooner or later, and he had no idea how to handle that option.

Etche was the only one who heard them, and she busied herself with crushing half a lime between two well trained fingers.

"I guess it's my turn to break my voice talking, now," Elda said.

Hardly noticing it as he intently watched her, Jak nodded.

"The house of Mar has always made sure to only have strong members," she said, turning to the polished stone of the bar, "Haven used to be filled with warriors. All the nobles were given their titles for bravery and victories. Hard to believe now, isn't it?"

"There are still strong people there," Jak said.

Elda nodded and smiled a bit.

"Yes, and it's a relief to know that. Considering what I heard about the last war, the spirit is still there."

"Right."

Somehow he managed to sound honest, even if he recalled a lot of soldiers loudly proclaiming their loss of hope. Most frustrating.

"My family rose up to greatness at the start of the Metal Head Wars," Elda continued, "and I met Damas."

The memory made her sigh softly, and she shook her head.

"Long story short, Praxis grabbed the power not too long after our wedding. We fled with a small group of allies, and came here. We hid in the marauder ruins in the wasteland at first, but from day one Damas led us to work on building better shelter. He was great like that…"

She fell silent.

"Hm," Jak idly murmured, unsure what to say.

They both stared down at the bar. It was far easier than to look the other in the eye.

I miss him, too.

It was painful to listen, and it must have been even worse to keep referring to Damas in past tense. But despite this Jak impatiently waited for Elda to continue. He wanted to know more, far more about his parents.

"The ruins could have been a good building ground," she finally begun again, "but there metal heads could come at us from all angles. By the ocean we had at least that to keep the land dwellers away, and here we could find better rocks to use for buildings as well."

She reached out and took his hand, looking up. Not until she started talking once more did he manage to meet her eyes, however.

"Spargus was almost finished when you were born," she said, a tiny smile gracing her lips.

Etche nearly dropped a glass, but Elda spoke in such a low voice that nobody else heard her. The queen went on without minding the bartender.

"Damas named you Mar to add to our hope," she said.

For a moment she paused and looked back down at the bar, sighing.

"The eco from our wells flourished when one of us carried you close to it," she said, squeezing his hand, "I guess… there was a rat somewhere who whispered to Veger."

Jak returned the squeeze, clenching his other hand until the fist shook.

"Whoever it was abducted you one night," Elda continued, speaking through her teeth now, "Damas led a troop hunting him down, but somehow he managed to slip away into Haven. After that, Sig got himself inside the walls by joining Krew, to look for you."

_"I've been Krew's heavy for years, and I've done things I'm not proud of."_

What exactly had it cost Sig to keep searching for his king's lost son? And despite that steel hard loyalty he had rebelled against that very king rather than fighting a friend, not even knowing the irony of the situation back then.

'Thanks, man… I owe you big,' Jak thought.

"I… was wounded and became like this in an attack by metal heads shortly after that," Elda said, interrupting Jak's thoughts.

She shook her head.

"Guess I wasn't able to focus properly on fighting. I was foolish, and Damas was furious for a very good reason. We made up eventually, but it took time."

Finally she looked up at Jak's grim face again, and managed to smile a little.

"But, I'm happy now, to have you back," she said, "it's made a lot of things worthwhile again."

She was about to add her crippled hand to the grip of his, but remembered the state of it in the last moment. At once she began to withdraw it. Jak quickly reached out and closed his other hand over hers, wrapping his fingers around the ones she had left.

It's okay.

Her smile widened a little, gratefully.

"We can probably write whoever took me away from you off as dead," he said, darkly humorous, "Kor was the one who brought me to the Underground."

The remains of Elda's eyebrows went up.

"Kor? As in, the metal head leader Kor?" she asked.

"Yeah, him. He wanted to make sure I found Mar's tomb."

'My tomb?' a runaway thought wondered.

He shook it off. The woman before him looked too high-spirited again for him to dive face first into such musings.

"Oh dear, dear…"

With an evil grin, Elda patted Jak's hands.

"Well then, at least I can amuse myself with nice images of the bastard's gory death."

"Oh yeah."

A similar grin crawled onto Jak's lips. Funny how such a huge creep could be useful.

Then again, Veger had been useful too, when saving the hero from becoming a divine rodent. Always something to his credit.

Muhahahaha.

Etche choose that moment to put the glasses with liquor down on the bar, and after doing so she quickly backed away. Those two were starting to sound _scary_, even for a wastelander woman.

Elda glanced at Jak's drink.

"Teskey on the rocks?" she guessed, "how simple."

She noticed the look on his face.

"What?"

"Is there an antidote to that?" Jak asked, unable to stop looking at the drink in front of his mother.

She picked up the glass and raised it, causing the neon green liquid to reflect the light of the nearest candle. It really did look lethal.

"Drinking should be an experience," she declared, "you only need a special kind of tongue to enjoy this."

With that, she took a sip. The effect was immediate.

"_Eugh_!"

Her face contorted in a grimace of pure agony, but at the same time she managed to wave at Jak's startled expression in a calming way. Coughing she set the glass down and gave Etche a thumbs up, watching the bartender through slit eyelids.

"Perfect!" the queen said, "puts rock grapefruit to shame!"

Her voice sounded quite a bit weird, however. Etche sent her that evil smile again, triumphantly this time.

"What the hell is that?" Jak asked, watching the offending drink with great suspicion.

"It's called 'Face Twister'."

Elda loudly cleared her throat, then took another small gulp with a similar result.

"Uhuh. I can see why…" Jak muttered, shaking his head as he sipped his by far milder teskey.

"Damas and I used to have competitions on finishing one these off as quickly and silent as possible," Elda said, her eyes pinched shut against the extremely sour taste gritting against her tongue, "it was the only thing I sometimes could beat him in."

The mental image of Damas' face stupidly contorting like Elda's just had done, turned out to be the first thought of his lost father that did not cause Jak any pain at all. He bent towards the bar, pressing a hand against his mouth to keep from spitting out the teskey as he chortled.

"Atta boy," Elda croaked, smirking.

That was when the door slammed open and Kleiver lumbered down the stair.

"Hey, poppy!"

Jak rolled his eyes but turned around on his chair.

"What?" he said.

"Ye seen that screwdriving friend a' ye's?"

The blonde blankly gazed up at the huge man, who by now towered above him.

"Who?" he said.

"That green-haired, timid little girl," Veger said from Kleiver's shoulder.

He looked awfully smug, beneath the constant look of exclusive suffering fuzziness of course.

"Keira?" Jak said, a confused frown starting to dig into his forehead.

"Yeah, she fixed me Shark pretty well," Kleiver said, unheeding the look on the short hero's face, "jus' wanna make sure she di'nt shrivel up after we left 'er with Sig. Would'a been a shame. Whaddaya lettin' yer weakling friends come here for anyway, this ain't no place for a gal like her."

"Wait, what's Keira doing here?" Jak demanded.

Kleiver looked down at him with an eyebrow raised.

"Ye di'nt know?"

"To answer your question," Veger cut in with all the slimy helpfulness that only one who only means harm can summon, "last we saw her, she looked like she was ready for the grave."

He flicked his tongue and looked up at the roof.

"Well!" he continued, "considering all the time she spent below that vehicle it really is no wonder."

Jak did not bother to listen to Veger's yapping anymore. He hopped off the barstool and started towards the stair in a quick stride, eyes growing harder for every step.

"I'll see you later!" he said over his shoulder, not even bothering to slow down for the quick goodbye.

"Now just hold on a second!" Elda protested.

She reached him quicker than her leg should have allowed, and grabbed a hold of his arm. Jak was forced to stop, turning around to face her. He could have easily broken free, but the stern look on her face held him.

"A bit of motherly advice," she said, "are you going to look for her because you're worried, or angry?"

Jak threw up his arms as good as he could considering the circumstances.

"I'm worried!" he snarled, "why the hell would she-"

"That I don't know," Elda interrupted him, "but it was probably for a good reason since she did it. Consider that while you look for her, alright?"

Jak glared at her for a moment, but finally nodded. While she did not look completely satisfied, she let go of him.

"Very well," she said, "I'll wait here for you."

"I promise I'll be back," Jak said, halfway up the stairs already.

Elda shook her head, sighing as she pressed a hand to her cheek. Still maintaining that position she headed back to her barstool.

"All grown up, he is," she murmured, tilting her head in a somewhat silly way towards Kleiver, "he's got to deal with things himself."

"Poppy's the real deal then?"

"I have no doubt about it," Elda said with an absentminded smile.

She suddenly perked up.

"Speaking of which…!"

"Yeek!" Veger protested as the skin of his neck was caught by the remaining fingers on the queen's right hand.

He pathetically struggled as she brought him to the height of her face.

"Say Veger, do you want a drink?" Elda asked, grinning evilly while slowly spinning the hand holding the Face Twister.

'-'

_Author's end note: _The Face Twister is courtesy of a bartender-in-training friend of mine, who probably has that special kind of tongue since she made that one up. Meep! Well, no, it's not actually as bad as I made it out to be. I think.


	10. Keira

Chapter 10, Bonds

As he slammed his heels into its sides, the leaper lizard beneath Jak squeaked in protest but sped up. The rider did not care if the animal was uncomfortable.

Only a few minutes ago he had been relaxing and daring to feel just a little happy for the first time in ages, but now anger clawed his heart. It was the only way he could deal with the choking, trembling feeling of fear deep down.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he tried to be reasonable and _know_ that he was overreacting. Kleiver had no respect for non-fighters, he would gladly blow things out of proportions. But it was Veger, once again Veger who strung Jak's mind like a devilish composer. He who had, would and could if given the slightest chance, take everything away. Again.

Just the fact that he had said anything at all about her, could spell Keira's doom.

"Sig…" Jak hissed, pulling the reins to make the lizard leap over a heap of boxes.

He hardly noticed the obstacles.

Logic still worked somewhat, leading him towards Sig's house first. There was only one place where Keira could have spent time "below that vehicle", and Sig lived close to the town gate.

More people were out by now, and he subconsciously steered the lizard to zigzag between the moving hindrances. His mind was elsewhere, and it was probably lucky that he was riding a sentient being and not a zoomer or buggy. The lizard could after all think practically as well, and it did not like being shot down by angry wastelanders. No sirree, not this lil' creature.

Further down the street and one stair higher up, Sig had been spending the last half hour picking his beloved Peace Maker apart and cleaning it. He was in the process of starting to put it back together again when he suddenly heard a familiar voice calling his name from the street below. It was not a happy voice, either.

"Crap," Sig concluded and stood up.

Throwing a glance at the bedroom, he saw Keira stir. Slowly she lifted her head and turned over, groggily looking at the tall man in the main room.

"Jak…?" she mumbled, hoarsely.

Sig hesitated for a moment, but when Jak roared at him again, the wastelander cursed and dove for the door. He tore it open and marched down the stair, narrowing his eyes at the blond man throwing himself off an exhausted leaper lizard. The poor beast staggered a few steps forwards before crashing in the nearest shadow of the wall. Jak had no such problems.

"Where's Keira?" he snarled, coming to a halt just before the lowest step of the stair.

Was this a good time to take Keira's joke about not wanting to be found seriously? As he looked down at Jak, Sig could really only conclude that the youngster not exactly looked like he was in a proper mood for seeing a lady. It could be heavily questioned whether he was worried beyond reason or royally pissed off. With that manic look in his eyes beneath the crumbled forehead, both options seemed possible.

How could he possibly be stopped, though? Sig doubted that Jak was in the proper mood for listening to reason, either. And stopping him by force, well… there was that "like the little brother I never had" business, plain friendship loyalty, lack of Peace Maker and the fact that people trying to put a stopper to Jak tended to end up making the landscape more colorful.

"I… guess I'm busted again…"

The weak voice came from behind Sig, and he turned around to see Keira stagger down the stair. She stopped three steps down, leaning against the wall while blinking sluggishly.

Not good.

Sig quickly reached for the woman, but before he could even start realizing that he needed to hurry up the stair to even touch her, a radiant flash carried on wings thin as spider web passed above him. He and Keira both blinked as the light shattered in a thousand tiny stars and Jak landed on the stair just beneath the young woman.

"Keira!"

His voice had lost the furious edge, this time sounding more choked than anything. Keira still flinched as his hand flew upwards, but relaxed again when he pressed it against her forehead.

"I'm okay, just sleepy…" she said, still hoarse.

"What are you doing here?" Jak demanded.

She bit her lower lip.

"More water?" Sig asked from below.

He could almost feel the gratefulness popping up inside Keira.

"Y-yes, please," she quickly said.

"Well don't just stand there, then!"

Nodding, Keira backed up and turned around to dive for cover inside Sig's simple home. Before he followed her, Jak threw a suspicious glance over his shoulder at the host. Sig glared back.

Somehow Jak managed to swallow his frustration and headed inside. He found Keira sitting down on the only chair in sight, and noted the small twitch of her fingers as she glanced at the pieces of the Peace Maker sprawled across the table. Had he been in a better mood, that would have made him smile.

She turned to face him as soon as he stepped through the door, and a glimmer of tension sparkled in her tired eyes.

This was the second time in a very short time that he had found her looking like a naughty child caught in the act, and it was quite aggravating. What had she hid from him _this_ time?

But the anger flared up again only momentarily. Keira slumped against the backrest of the chair, exhaust taking all priority from her guilty look. How could one be angry with somebody who looked like that?

No, he had not really been angry, now had he? He had almost expected to find her dead. The problem was that he completely lacked the sense to deal with worry in a civilized manner.

Jak's mental beating himself over his head was interrupted by Sig.

"Hey, move already."

A big hand shoved at Jak's back and he stumbled forwards, making way for the taller elf. Sig grabbed an empty clay bowl from the table and filled it with water from the barrel in the right corner of the room. Silently Jak watched all this, and he held his peace until Keira had taken the bowl and a few deep gulps of water. As she lowered the bowl, he decided that the time had run out.

"Now, what are you doing here?" he repeated.

He saw her jaw clench, and when she looked up her tired eyes had narrowed slightly.

"I was worried about you," she said in a defensive tone.

"What?"

What he really meant was "what does that have to do with almost giving yourself a sunstroke", but with his usual luck with words only that first one made it.

Keira glanced at Sig for support. Knowing that he already was knee-deep in, the wastelander simply decided to go along and help again.

"Your little friend here came over to tell me that you didn't seem to be doing too well," Sig said.

He crossed his arms as Jak turned to him with a frown on his forehead.

"I was thinkin' of talking with ya about my mess-up with you and Damas," he continued and nodded at Keira, "she just got me to do it sooner. Elda wanted you here too, anyway…"

"I didn't even know about Elda," Keira added.

All three of them shared an uncomfortable feeling that this somehow had turned into a miniature trial of some kind. Jak looked between the two defendants, trying to sort out whether he was just confused or irritated.

Why all this secrecy? Why would they have to make things so convoluted all of a sudden? If they cared- no, not they.

"Why didn't you come to me yourself if you were worried?" Jak asked Keira, the frown still stuck on his forehead.

She looked up at him, her fingers turning white against the bowl.

"I never knew Damas," she said.

She had to use all the willpower and morals vested in her to keep from mentioning Ashelin, and could only hope that Jak would not ask about her. Keira knew that she was not that strong even in decency.

"Is that such a disadvantage that you won't even- gah!"

Jak took in a deep breath and pressed a hand against the back of his neck to calm down. As soon as he trusted his voice again, he tried once more.

"Why not, Keira?" he said.

Her fingers nervously drummed against the bowl as she watched Jak.

Sig gave up.

"Tell you what, people," he said, "I'm going out. I'm coming back in two hours. Sort this out by then. See ya."

And with that, he fled the battlefield of emotions. While he did feel naked going out without his Peace Maker, it was a small price to pay to get away from the tense air inside. As he stomped down the street, he decided to find Seem, order her to start praying, and then go buy himself a drink. A strong one.

Not once did Jak look away from Keira's face, even as Sig left and closed the door behind him. Realizing that she had no way out of this, she closed her eyes for a moment and tried to assemble her cracked composure.

"It's like… with the guns I was working on…" she finally said in a low voice.

Jak raised an eyebrow, but forced himself to remain silent. Such a strange thing for him to do, really.

Keira looked up at him, guilt exchanged for frustration in her eyes.

"I want to help you, Jak, I've always wanted to help you!" she said, as forceful as she could considering how tired she was, "it's just that…!"

She paused and looked down at the water and pottery in her lap.

"I can't do anything anymore."

"That's-" Jak started.

But she was so drowsy and her brain did not want to work properly and he was staring at her without the faintest understanding and she was starting to feel ill and everything just came crashing down on her, just like it had done when she tried to ally with Ashelin yesterday.

"When was I last able to help you with anything?" she snarled, the bowl starting to shake as she pressed her unsteady hands against it, "honestly, Jak? Ever since I helped you race for my team and made the Rift Rider, what, _what_ have I added? And even back then I- I was such an idiot…"

She pressed a hand against her eyes, gritting her teeth. The sudden touch of a hand on each of her shoulders made her look up again. Jak more glared than watched her, again. He seemed to always do that with everything nowadays, on the other hand.

"When did you become such a girl?" he asked, repeating the question from the last day.

Busted. Third time in two days. The "little girl" act was always much simpler when she was not so bloody drowsy, and now she had messed it up again.

Oh, this would be a riot. How in the Precursors' names could she possibly make this come out right? And he kept glaring, despite all her efforts to tell herself that he surely did not mean to look that irritated.

"I was- was stupid," she tried to start, "I should've… Erol…"

Her voice cracked up, held back tears of frustration and the thirst teaming up against her. Desperately she raised the bowl and filled her mouth, gulping down small amounts of the liquid to gain a little time. Jak could not wait until she was done.

"That's in the past," he said, squeezing her shoulders, "I'm not mad about that."

Keira tried not to choke on the water, and lowered the bowl again. Blinking furiously against the tears to keep them from coming, she tried to face Jak again.

"But I was! Am!" she said in a harsh whisper, "and then things only got worse in Haven…"

All the attacks from metal heads and the uprising of the Krimzon Death Bots, all the missions away from Keira and Samos, all the attacks he had fought back with Torn, Sig and Ashe- oh hell.

A suspicion began to grow in Jak's mind, and his frown only grew deeper. As Keira remained silent, staring down at her lap in a futile search for words to carry her, he decided to give it a try.

"Ashelin?" he said, his voice as low as hers.

Keira bit down on her lower lip again, nodding.

"I thought she understood you better than I ever could," she whispered, every second word coming out as a hiss, "I thought you needed somebody like that better."

Jak could only stare at her for several moments, his mind in complete chaos. He wanted to shake her and scream that she was stupid, press her against him and assure that she was wrong, demand to know how she could have been such a moron, and he definitely wanted to be at loss of words for her sacrifice. He could have doubted it, suspected that she was just trying to worm herself out of an unwanted relationship by making excuses, but Keira looked up at him with such bitterness that he could not feel even the tiniest grain of distrust.

And as he started to calm down a little and sort out his feelings, the first realization was that the assurance that she had been wrong, could not be spoken honestly. He breathed in deeply and faced her.

"Keira… when we met again in Haven, met properly I mean," he said, trying to keep his voice under control, "after the race, the first thing I did was finding the nearest loudspeaker and listen to Praxis' bullshit for a while."

She watched him blankly. Nodding, he continued:

"I was feeling better, and it didn't work back then. I needed to be pissed to keep moving."

You calmed me down. Even when jealous.

There was a slight sparkle in her eyes now, even if it still could not be called even relieved. At least it was bit by bit getting there.

"It's not- I'm not like that now," Jak said, squeezing her shoulders again, "I don't want to be… rash anymore."

Some strange part of her brain made Keira move the bowl of water to the table, but her hands fell back into her lap even after that.

"I know…" she whispered, "that you kissed Ashelin…"

Jak flinched, but only for a moment. He had hoped that the news had not spread.

"No, she kissed me," he said, shaking his head, "I shouldn't have let her."

"Huh," Keira mumbled, still passively looking up at him, "and all those times we tried to kiss and something got in between…"

A small smile was slowly forming on her lips, however. Not a dreamy one. A real one.

"Dax isn't here," Jak murmured, moving his hands to her back.

Keira reached up and hung her heavy arms around his neck, letting him lift her into standing. And finally, finally nothing stopped them mere inches from touching each other's lips. Even to Keira's dozy mind it was wonderfully sweet, even with the slightly rough taste of teskey remaining in Jak's mouth, even though they both knew that this was unfair to another woman. Everything else but "right now" could wait until later.

She struggled against the mist filling her head, weighing down her eyelids. No, no, no! Not now!

It must have been even more apparent than she already feared it was, because the corners of Jak's eyes crinkled in mild amusement. His lips left hers, and he bent down.

"Hey…!" Keira weakly protested as her feet left the floor.

Jak merely smirked and stepped inside the sleeping room. He put her down on the carpet and seated himself beside her, both leaning their backs against the warm wall. Keira's cheek sunk down onto Jak's shoulder as his arm remained behind her neck.

She could feel his gaze on her face, and told herself that she would only close her eyes for a couple of minutes. But just before she was about to slip into unwanted slumber, Jak's voice momentarily brought her back.

"Just… one more thing before you fall asleep," he said.

The amusement that had been there previously was suddenly gone, and instead he sounded dead serious. Keira's eyes snapped open and she looked up at him, trying to lift her heavy head.

"What?" she mumbled.

His hand squeezed her shoulder, and his head lowered a little.

"There are things I can't risk no matter what, Keira," he said, sighing softly, "you know I'm shock-full of dark eco."

In her state, it took Keira several moments to realize what he meant. As it finally dawned on her, she raised her hand and stroke his cheek. He needed to shave, but that was irrelevant.

"We'll think of something later…" she murmured.

"No. It's too dangerous," Jak insisted, clenching his teeth.

Finally Keira managed to raise her head and give him a sleepy smile.

"You're just saying that because you know I'll take it as a challenge," she said.

"No, I'm serious… hey."

Her head had already fallen back onto his shoulder, and her eyes were firmly closed. Jak sighed again, carefully shaking his head not to disturb her. He leant his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, listening to Keira's soft breathing.

Hmm. How strange. He liked this peacefulness. The near silence completely failed to drive him insane with lack of things to occupy his mind… well, actually the silence was offering. That, and the weight of the closeness to Keira.

This was a good moment.

A couple of hours later Sig and Elda found the pair sleeping just like that, but silently decided to leave them. There would always be another air train, and even if there for some reason would not, did it even matter to those two?

The world was a good place.

_The End._

_End note: _Again, thanks to everyone who reviewed.

All characters and places (except for Elda and Etche) belong to Naughty Dog Inc, who have done a wonderful job with the Precursor Legacy Trilogy. This piece of fanfiction was written for fun and I didn't get a penny from working on it. I doubt I'll get a penny later, either. Or even a cent. Or any other bit of currency.

Ah yes, one more thing before I leave you to your homework and other things, let me just address one more thing left in an earlier review, by quoting a truly great man:

"Think of it as _Star Wars_. Its stories are broken up into trilogies, but they're part of a bigger, more involving saga. Just because the _Precursor Legacy_ may be coming to an end, it doesn't mean that we are."

-Evan Wells, Game Director of Naughty Dog, on the question whether Jak 3 was the end of Jak and Daxter. Quote taken from ign . com . (remove the spaces, this place eats even fragments of links. Pff.)

So no, I don't think we'll be forever left hanging wondering what the Mar-Jak connection is. :)


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